7 posts tagged “art”
Oliver Sacks has an article in the NYT today that talks about the patterns that are associated with migraines. Here's a little excerpt:
"In my own migraine auras, I would sometimes see — vividly with closed eyes, more faintly and transparently if I kept my eyes open — tiny branching lines, like twigs, or geometrical structures covering the entire visual field: lattices, checkerboards, cobwebs, and honeycombs. Sometimes there were more elaborate patterns, like Turkish carpets or complex mosaics; sometimes I saw scrolls and spirals, swirls and eddies; sometimes three-dimensional shapes like tiny pine cones or sea urchins.
Such patterns, I found, were not peculiar to me, and years later, when I worked in a migraine clinic, I discovered that many of my patients habitually saw such patterns." -- from Patterns, by Oliver Sacks
Sacks discusses how many other physical conditions can produce geometric hallucinations: sensory deprivation, low blood sugar, fever, delirium, or the hypnopompic and hypnagogic states that come immediately before and after sleep.
I've experienced some of these patterns, particularly when I'm drifting off to sleep. I've seen some beautiful patterns, interesting enough that they almost pushed me to full awakening. I've thought, "What a great combination of colors. I'll have to remember that tomorrow." And of course, I can never remember.
Sacks then ties the migraine patterns to patterns that have been represented in art across cultures, times and disciplines--painting, weaving, tile work, basketry, architecture--and wonders whether these similar geometric patterns could have all been inspired by internal brain organization.
It's a fascinating article. I've always been drawn to organized forms, repetitive images, patterns of shape and color. Perhaps I've been tapping into a larger historical or biological system of organization, made tangible by artists throughout time.
The last week was very busy socially....on Wednesday, we had the BoughHouse event. It was a great success...lots of interesting people, tasty food, wine donated by Barolo Grill. We raised over $6000 for the Rocky Mountain Children's Law Center, which wasn't bad considering that this was only the second year of the BH event. The total earnings were double last year's. The only unfortunate thing was that many of the trees, including mine, were sold for much less than they were worth. I guess that happens quite a bit at art auctions, but Sarah was a little sick about it. My tree was purchased by a couple who are very involved in the Denver art scene -- John works for the Museum of Contemporary Art -- so that made me happy. And I won a mobile made by our friend Scott Sturgis, which was also sold for much less than it was worth. But I was so glad to get it, and couldn't have afforded it at a much higher price.
Then on Thursday, Henry and I went to see Henry C.'s band concert at the Denver School of the Arts. It was a great concert, and a beautiful facility. I started thinking about how nice it would be for Henry to be in an environment that nurtured creativity. Morey (Henry's middle school) is a good school, and Henry is happy there socially, but he's definitely not getting a lot of creative encouragement. So I checked out the DSA website when we got home, and it turned out that Friday (the next day) was the deadline for applying for DSA for the 2008-2009 school year. So I sent in an application and talked to the video arts department head, and now Henry has an audition set up. Ted is not enthusiastic. I'm not even sure Henry is enthusiastic. So we'll have to sort this out....maybe it's crazy to even look into the School of the Arts, but maybe it would be more fun and stimulating for Henry.
Back to fish. In my post on 12/8, I was discussing my inexplicable affinity for drawing fish. As I mentioned, my friend Kelton Osborn has also been drawn to fish. (Hmmm....draw, drawn. Just looked it up, and "draw" is from the Latin root duco, ducere meaning lead or draw. Draw has many, many meanings. But I digress.)
My sister thoughtfully sent me an entry from an online symbolism dictionary, in the hopes of clarifying the fish attraction. Here are some of the highlights:
"The symbolic nature of fish is as inseparable from that of WATER as the two are connected in life. In psychology, water symbolizes the depths of the unconscious, and fish are the "live material from the depths of the personality, relating to fertility and the life-giving powers of the maternal realms within us" (Biederman, 131). Yet fish are also cold-blooded, not driven by passion, and often represent such emotionless entities.
So that's helpful. Depending on my mood, I can be concerned that I might be an emotionless entity, or be comforted by the knowledge that I'm not in danger of drowning in the ocean of sufferings.
Kelton, my very talented architect/designer/artist friend, was kind enough to send me the darkly beautiful fish lithographs included in this post. Obviously, the smiley pen-and-ink fish is mine.
Just wondering: if religion and art have the power to bring people together, doesn't sport also have that same power? What better way to join "a tribe" than to support a particular team? Although, people who support teams do so for a vast number of reasons, and come to that team from many different backgrounds. Ted, for example, is an OU football fanatic, but he doesn't necessarily have a lot in common with other OU fanatics besides the love of the team. He went to OU, but so did I, and I couldn't care less about the OU football team. It takes the personal connection with the team, plus an interest in football, to create a fanatic. And it takes a bunch of fanatics to make a "tribe," or group of like-minded people. However -- if one had to choose the most cohesive "tribe," probably those people who were joined together by an interest in sports teams would be among the least homogeneous. UNLESS they were still in college, in which case the individuals would be similar in age and circumstance. I suspect that the most homogeneous tribe would be the one brought together by religion.
There was an article in the New York Times a couple of days ago that got me thinking about the evolutionary and genetic aspects of art. It was in the science section, and was titled The Dance of Evolution, or How Art Got Its Start. The premise is that the creative drive, rather than being frivolous, is actually an evolutionary adaptation of its own. The making of art has drawn people together across cultures and times, and so has value in its ability to bring individuals and communities together. As the article says,
"Through singing, dancing, painting, telling fables of neurotic mobsters who visit psychiatrists, and otherwise engaging in what [neurobiologist Ellen] Dissanayake calls “artifying,” people can be quickly and ebulliently drawn together, and even strangers persuaded to treat one another as kin. Through the harmonic magic of art, the relative weakness of the individual can be traded up for the strength of the hive, cohered into a social unit ready to take on the world."
This idea of social coherence is also a currently trendy marketing idea: consumer products help people feel like they belong to a "tribe," and therefore define who they are. "What tribe are you part of?" is a question that design, style and marketing is supposed to help one answer.
The NYT article continues, "As David Sloan Wilson, an evolutionary theorist at Binghamton University, said, the only social elixir of comparable strength is religion, another impulse that spans cultures and time."
Interesting.
Makes me wonder whether this aesthetic/conceptual separation between
people, or "tribes," will become more distinct and divisive, or if we
could somehow work toward a return to more community-oriented art. Art
as unifier, rather than divider.
I took Henry with me to Cherry Creek to deliver my tree/lamp donation to One Home for the Bough House project. I knew he would enjoy seeing the trees that were created by architects and designers, and also he likes modern furniture and design. As I suspected, he looked closely at everything and noticed connections between the art displayed at One Home and his own work on Line Rider. He has a natural tendency to use repeating patterns that are very graphic and tightly composed. He also has a really good grasp of positive/negative space. Here's a logo that he designed for himself in the Line Rider program, and that he uses as his signature when he posts on Line Rider blogs and message boards.
The lamp/tree has been delivered. It was harder than I anticipated to put it all together. I had some mishaps with the Liquid Nails and also the printing process. Here are a couple of pics:
