Final Video

Colours of Sound from Jess Nicholas on Vimeo.

Video translation - "superhumans"

video translation: it starts 4:30 

the doctor in the documentary thinks synesthesia can make more than just mix senses together, it can also result in a better memory. Elisabeth, the girl from the documentary, can also see the sound of words for example, the word “window” makes her see white because of the sound of the “e” sees black on the “a” and green on the “w”. She states she sees words from a 3-5 meter distance. The doctor then preforms an experiment on Elisabeth; he reads 15 words to her and later asks her if he can remember those words. She remembers 10 of 15 words, slightly above average. Later on, the doctor preforms another activity with the aim of distracting Elisabeth, and 30 minutes later asks her if she remembers the original list, after this, she remembered 14 of 15 words, which is very unusual and proves the doctor’s theory. 

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Further research

http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/music/kanye-west-sounds-synesthesia-latest-rant-article-1.2642645

Rapper Kanye West's latest raucous rant crescendoed to the topic of synesthesia.

Speaking on Thursday's episode of "Ellen," the ever-outspoken rapper credited his artistic genius to the neurological condition that allows him to physically envision every musical note as a colorful manifestation.

"I have a condition called synesthesia where I see sounds," West told the audience and host Ellen DeGeneres. "Everything I sonically make is a painting. I see it. I see the importance and the value of everyone being able to experience a more beautiful life."

It's not the first time West has spoken up about the phenomenon — and other big name artists including Pharrell Williams and Charli XCX have claimed to have the ability to visualize music.

http://www.elisabethsulser.ch/en/synaesthesie/

Martian Colours

We also observed one case in which we believe cross activation enables a colorblind synesthete to see numbers tinged with hues he otherwise cannot perceive; charmingly, he refers to these as “Martian colors.” Although his retinal color receptors cannot process certain wavelengths, we suggest that his brain color area is working just fine and being cross-activated when he sees numbers…

The effect is most obvious and pronounced in the colorblind synesthetes, but occurs in “regular” synesthetes as well. The colors evoked by cross activation in the fusiform gyrus “bypass” earlier stages of color processing in the brain, which may confer an unusual tint to the colors evoked. This is important for understanding the phenomenon of synesthesia, because it suggests that the qualia label–that is, the subjective experience of the color sensation–depends not merely on the final stages of processing but on the total pattern of neural activity, including earlier stages. (http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/cosmicvariance/2007/11/05/martian-colors/#.WAjtrIReCqC)

I have found that many synaesthetes often see colours that they cannot explain, reproduce, or relate to any colour that they have seen in the real world. This is another example of 'martian colours' and opens debate about whether synaesthetes can see colours past the visible spectrum that can be seen by humans.

Martian colours are thought to be so unusual because information has not taken the usual route (eye -> V1 -> V4) but instead went to a grapheme area first and then entered V4 (eye -> V1 -> grapheme area -> V4). Similarly, musically induced Martian colours may look so weird because auditory information recoded in V4 simply isn’t of the same quality as visual information which comes from V1. (https://brainsidea.wordpress.com/2012/07/02/how-are-invisible-colours-possible/)

Artist with Synaesthesia paints popular songs

http://www.melissasmccracken.com

Wednesday is Indigo Blue: Discovering the Brain of Synaesthesia

Wednesday is Indigo Blue: Discovering the Brain of Synaesthesia is a factual book published in 2009, written by Richard E. Cytowic M.D. and David M. Eagleman Ph.D. The book attempts to document the current level of scientific understanding regarding the condition of Synaesthesia.

                        Main points understood from book:

•  Many synaesthetes consider having synaesthesia a completely normal condition, not realising that this only occurs in 1-5% of the population (research from the University of Sussex and University of Edinburgh). Some go the majority of their lives without realising that Synaesthesia is not innate in everybody, such as Jean Milogav, a Swiss synesthete, reached her sixties before realising that sensing the alphabet and numerals as coloured was rather unusual.
• The most common forms of synaesthesia tend to be experiencing time as a spatial/visual concept and various association with colour seem to be prominent in most synaesthetes. Some forms are less common than others however, such as tasting shapes. It is possible to possess more synaesthetic characteristics than one, many can overlap, as was the case with Sheresevsky, who remembered limitless amounts thanks to a fivefold synesthesia that spanned his senses. For example, a bell triggered seven simultaneous perceptions for Sheresevsky: "I heard the bell ringing . . . a small, round object rolled before my eyes . . . my fingers sensed something rough like a rope . . . I experienced a taste of salt water . . . and something white."
• Historically, when there was no scientific explanation for synaesthesia, the misconception was that synaesthetes simply had an 'overactive imagination, their experiences were drug induced or that they were crazy artists'. "Many in the scientific establishment rolled their eyes at the notion of synesthesia and tried to explain away a very common type—namely, sensing letters and numbers as colored even though they are printed in black ink—by arguing that synesthetes were just “remembering” childhood associations from coloring books or refrigerator magnets."
• Once a synaesthetic association is made, it becomes 'locked in' and the same associations will be present often for life.

In the case of colored letters and numbers, the brain area crucial for recognizing letter and numeral graphemes (the green area in figure 1.2) is positioned in the left hemisphere just next to the color perception area (the red area in figure 1.2) called V4. Because of increased cross talk, the appearance of a letter triggers activation in the V4 color area. It is interest- ing that despite having normal color vision, synesthetes commonly say they experience “weird” or “ugly” colors they would not deliberately choose.

http://www.sussex.ac.uk/synaesthesia/faq FAQ on research conducted by the University of Sussex, containing extensive information regarding Synaesthesia.

David Batchelor/Chromophobia

 

Although not directly related to our topic of synaesthesia, David Batchelor is a contemporary artist who focusses much of his work around colour, which could be interesting when looking at colour theory and its importance.

David Batchelor (born 1955, Dundee) is a Scottish artist, writer, and a Senior Tutor in Critical Theory in the Department of Curating Contemporary Art at the Royal College of Art in London.

Batchelor is interested in reconsidering colour theories from a contemporary context, which he explores in Chromophobia (2000), a book dedicated to the subject. His dazzlingly saturated objects reconsider the tension between form and the very materiality of colour, perhaps with a wink to earlier forms of light and neon art. “I often use colour to attack form, to break it down a little or begin to dissolve it. But I am not at all interested in ‘pure’ colour or in colour as a transcendental presence… So if I use colours to begin to dissolve forms, I also use forms to prevent colours becoming entirely detached from their everyday existence.” (http://www.saatchigallery.com/artists/david_batchelor.htm?section_name=shape_of_things)

Chromophobia

Chromophobia (also known as chromatophobian or chrematophobia) is a persistent, irrational fear of, or aversion to, colours and is usually a conditioned response. While actual clinical phobias to color are rare, colors can elicit hormonal responses and psychological reactions.

Chromophobia manifests itself in the many and varied attempts to purge colour from culture, to devalue colour, to diminish its significance, to deny its complexity. More specifically: this purging of colour is usually accomplished in one of two ways. In the first, colour is made out to be the property of some ‘foreign’ body - usually the feminine, the oriental, the primitive, the infantile, the vulgar, the queer or the pathological. In the second, colour is relegated to the realm of the superficial, the supplementary, the inessential or the cosmetic. In one, colour is regarded as alien and therefore dangerous; in the other, it is perceived merely as a secondary quality of experience, and thus unworthy of serious consideration." (David Batchelor, excerpt from Chromophobia, London: Reaktion, 2000, p. 22-23.)

Ratatouille, Synaesthesia and Michel Gagne

Do you ever remember watching this little Disney film Ratatouille and watching Remy try new food? He savoured every mouth and in that very scene colours were exploding and swirling left and right to visualise what he was tasting. While back then we thought nothing of it other than just a cool way to show the scene, it's interesting that in fact, it was a display of Synaesthesia at work!

The animator behind these amazing scenes is Michel Gagne who is also a synaesthete who was pulled into the film to help with these two scenes to play around with taste visualisation, though at the time they did not really call it Synaesthesia because even Michel at the time was not familiar the trait that he had. It was interesting to see how he laid out what taste might look like in an abstract way where he first did a few sketches for the director and composer before the music was composed and then the animations were composited:

(All artwork above is Copyright ©2007 Pixar/Disney)

Here is also a link to his website showing his process through Ratatouille: http://www.gagneint.com/Final%20site/Animation/Pixar/Ratatouille.htm

During an interview with Psychology Today back in 2013 (link), Michel described the forms of synaesthesia he experiences; the blending of sound and colours and shapes:

"I've had episode of a synaesthetic nature from an early age but I had no idea what they were. In fact, I used to describe these experiences with my eye doctors who didn't seem to know what I was talking about.  

My experiences are as follow - for no apparent reason, I start seeing strange zigzags of colors and distortion in my field of vision. The experience amplifies until my entire field of vision is filled with fireworks. For about thirty minutes, I have to sit down, laydown or if I'm driving, pull on the side of the road. The experience is very gradual, so I have ample time to react to it. They are also rare events, happening no more than three or four times a year.  

A few years ago, I started searching the web and came upon the term "synaesthetic migraine". The videos confirmed that I wasn't the only one experiencing these weird visions. After all these years, I'd finally put a label on the condition. In fact, I found out that even my wife had the condition! As I got deeper into my research, I found out about another form of synaesthesia. One where the senses blend in unexpected way. I'm not sure I have "that" per se, but I do feel I've found a way to have these experiences. When I listen to music or sounds, with proper concentration, I can let my senses overlap with one another. Abstract pioneer, Kandinsky, believed that forms and colors had equal vibrations in the soul. I think that might have been what he was talking about. After I finished showing Paul Plimley my visual interpretation of his music with my film, "Sensology", he looked at me with tears in his eyes and said, "You read my soul"."

Though Ratatouille may be one of the bigger films Michel has been apart of, along with Disney/Pixar's Brave, he has also done a few short films that embraced his synaesthesia, transforming it into art:

"Sensology (2010)"

"Synesthesia (2014)"

Concept Art for Coldplay's "Charlie Brown" Music Video

(Artwork belongs to Michel Gagne from his website)

Having realised that even a film like Ratatouille had an influence from the blending of senses and that there are more synaesthetes out there, especially in the creative field, than we thought, who knows what other art or media has also been influenced by it?

Anime "Terror in Resonance"

Noting the compelling nature of synesthesia through research and interest in animation. I found out that in the anime series of "Terror in Resonance" the character 'Twelve' mentioned in episode 6- ready or not that at he suffers from synesthesia as he mentions that he sees colours through sound, and describes one of the charterers voice as being a "pale yellow".This is great supporting evidence for our research for synesthesia but also it  allows us a group to go for a different style of medium such as animation rather then real life which maybe be more effect and creative in some way.

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terror_in_Resonance

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    

     

                 

South Korean drama "The Girl Who Sees Smells"

Being a huge fan of Korean dramas I just discovered that the Korean drama "The Girl Who Sees Smells" is based on our chosen topic synaesthesia. This highlights the fact that synaesthesia is not only  inherited or based in London/UK but its also well known in other countries such as Korea. Hence our  topic makes it  more easier for us to research  more broader outcomes like different interpretation of synaesthesia in culture but also helps us as a group to  target people in certain areas in the world who have the neurological disorder. According to the Asian Wikipedia the plot of this drama is based "3 years ago, where a man lost his younger sister in the "Bar Code" murder case. Since then he has lost his senses. A girl miraculously survived the "Bar code" murder case. Since then, she has lost her memory, but also has gained the ability to see smells." This drama is a great starting point for us as to how we would like to visualise or interpretate mise-en-scene or even style within our short video.( http://asianwiki.com/The_Girl_Who_Sees_Smells) 

              

James Turrell Research

James Turrell

"James Turrell is an American visual artist who makes enclosures designed to control and reimagine the viewers experience of light. Turrell started working with light in 1966 in his Santa Monica studio around the same time that  Los Angeles based artists Robert Irwin and Doug Wheeler, the self titled Light and Space group, were also rising in the art world. His work focuses on how we see and experience light and color and  he has been the recipient of many awards and exhibitions such as the MacArthur Genius Fellowship, inclusion in the profound PBS documentary Art:21, has a current exhibition at the Guggenheim Museum in New York as well as being the subject of a recent retrospective at LACMA." (Source: http://blog.colourstudio.com/2013/07/color-icon-james-turrell.html)

 “My work is more about your seeing than it is about my seeing, although it is a product of my seeing. I’m also interested in the sense of presence of space; that is space where you feel a presence, almost an entity — that physical feeling and power that space can give.”

(Jamesturrell.com)

The work of Turrell's that stands out to me most from researching his works is the ganzfield series. The way in which it uses colour to challenge perceptions and to create an immersive experience for the audience may be something that we could experiment with as a group.

“Ganzfeld”: a German word to describe the phenomenon of the total loss of depth perception as in the experience of a white-out. http://jamesturrell.com/work/type/ganzfeld/

Visual Music: Synaesthesia in Art and Music Since 1900, Thames & Hudson

"Visual Music traces an alternate history of abstract art of the past century... In effect, the idea of synaesthesia served to mediate between music and visual art in the early twentieth century and proved essential to the development of abstraction. Emphasising the perceiving subject, the theory of synaesthesia tended to break down sense perception into discrete units, whereby one sensation found its equivalent in another; music, with its notes and phrases, harmony and dissonance, compositional structures and abstract notational system, lent itself most readily to such analogy" (Page 16)

Synchromism - An art movement founded in the early 1900's by Macdonald-Wright and Russell analogising colour to music.

"Colour is the keyboard. The eye is the hammer. The soul is the piano, with its many strings. The artist is the hand that purposefully sets the soul vibrating by means of this or that key. Thus it is clear that the harmony of colours can only be based upon the principle of purposefully touching the human soul"
"Such highly sensitive people are like good, much-played violins, which vibrate in all their parts and fibres at every touch of the bow. If one accepts this explanation, then admittedly sight must not be related to taste, but to all the other senses. Many colours have an uneven, prickly appearance, while others feel smooth, like velvet... Finally our hearing of colours is so precise that it would perhaps be impossible to find anyone who would try to represent his impression of bright yellow by means of the bottom register of the piano"

Kandinsky, On the Spiritual in Art, 160, 158-159

• For Kandinsky, the artistic coming together of the senses in this way was a kind of spiritual experience.
• For Kandinsky, an art based upon multi sensory aesthetic experience promised spiritual redemption

(Left) from artist Marsden Hartley, portrays a musical theme, (Oriental Symphony).

(Right) from artist Man Ray, an ambitious oil painting providing a visual representation of a symphonic orchestra.

Georgia O'Keefe's Music - Pink and Blue II, 1919. O'Keefe was not a synaesthete but consciously attempted to translate music into art.

The image above shows how different interpretations of musical scales have been made in terms of colour over three centuries. The people above have tried to create an analogy of colour and sound, each mapping them together differently, even going as far as to compare hues to musical pitch.

Other Research



Synaesthesia brought to the big screen - Disney's Fantasia

Note: Research German Scientist Wilhelm Wundt, who conducted systematic studies of synaesthetic perception.

‘Light Motif’-Short Film Starring a Monkey

Light Motif from Frédéric Bonpapa on Vimeo- "The inspiration for the project stems from the relationship between music and the visual arts, illustrated by artists such as Wassily Kandinsky, Oskar Fischinger, Norman McLaren or John Whitney. These works try to establish precise connections between sounds, shapes, colors and movements, to visually translate the concepts of rhythm, melody, harmony, pitch, timbre and intensity."

Derek Jarman "Blue"

The movie "Blue"by Derek Jarman denotes a saturated blue screen which is accompanied by a soundtrack of a voice over where we hear Derek Jarman and a few chosen actors to narrate his life and vision through vocal voice over.The movie Blue was released prior before his death from AIDS.

Christopher Doyle has called the movie "one of the most intimate films I've ever seen". 

http://www.tate.org.uk/whats-on/tate-modern/display/derek-jarman-blue 

                               https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_(1993_film)

A Synaesthesia Tube Map

                                    http://londonist.com/2013/08/a-synaesthesia-tube-map

Research & Inspiration

http://www.bbc.co.uk/culture/story/20140904-i-see-songs-in-colour

'Wall of sound'

Ryan is far from the only artist to attempt to recreate their synaesthesia, of course. Perhaps best known is Wassily Kandinsky, whose abstract paintings  were his experience of seeing music in colour, line and form. His 1911 work Impression III (Concert) was inspired by a concert in Munich at which he heard the music of Arnold Schoenberg, and while the painting has some representational elements, its vivid wash of yellow describes sound itself. Kandinsky wrote on the subject with a spiritual fervour: “Colour is the keyboard. The eye is the hammer. The soul is the piano with its many strings. The artist is the hand that purposely sets the soul vibrating by means of this or that key.”
'Kandinsky played the cello – an instrument that, for him, evoked a deep blue, a colour he also used heavily. Although not commonly cited as a synaesthete, it’s interesting to note that Henri Matisse described the same rich, deep blue – famously used in his Blue Nudes – as affecting the viewer like “a vigorous stroke of a gong."

https://www.visualnews.com/2015/04/19/artist-with-synesthesia-paints-music-the-way-she-sees-it/

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/features/jack-coulter-meet-the-young-artist-with-synesthesia-who-hears-colour-and-saves-lives-with-his-a6856261.html

Jack Coulter

Video & Imagery Discussion

During our feedback session which was on the 29th of September, our tutors provided us a range of resources to look and analysis at so that it will help us to establish the vision and style of our work.This will benefit us as a group to gather more analytic research,knowledge and inspiration as to what we would like to aspire and to create in the following stages of development.

This includes the following resources:

• Derek Jarman -Blue
• The skin of the film- Laura U Marks 
• Textures of light - Cathryn Vasseleu 
• Ways of Seeing - John Berger  
• Chromophobia-Victor Burgin James Turrell

Below I created a presentation of the various videos and imagery which our tutors has presented for us and as a  group we will discuss the positive and negatives of each work and how we will may/not incorporate some elements within our very own product.The discussion will be presented on different slides which we were all allocated with.

            

Further Research Into Synaesthesia

•  Animation short of how Synaesthesia could be interpreted from the senses of sound to sight through colours: https://vimeo.com/36252713
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHnnGHgeyC0 - A short narrative-style film attempting to visually portray synaesthesia.
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4upZHjZnM-0 - Synaesthesia explanation
• BBC covers an installation about experiencing synaesthesia and and interview about how it works http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-33803581
• http://londonist.com/2016/09/what-does-london-taste-like - An interview with the president of the UKSA about what London tastes likes
• Similar effect or look along with more objects and stuff? http://www.wabbaly.com/ars-thanea-creative-portrait-photography/
• We could try and contact the UK Synaesthesia Association http://www.uksynaesthesia.com/

Synaesthesia a neurological phenomenon in which stimulation of one sensory or cognitive pathway leads to automatic, involuntary experiences in a second sensory or cognitive pathway.

• Anaesthesia - insensitivity to pain, especially as artificially induced by the administration of gases or the injection of drugs before surgical operations. (could be interesting to juxtapose?)
• SYN – TOGETHER
• AESTHESIA - SENSATION
• Relevant words/phrases: “I may see things differently” “PAIRINGS REMAIN FIXED. FOR LIFE.” “BLENDING OF THE SENSES” “Wired”
• "mirror touch" synaesthesia: experiencing touch just by looking at someone being touched.

Wassily Kandinsky (1866-1944)

• Russian painter and art theorist, known for creating one of the first abstract pieces
• Born in Moscow

One of the pioneers of abstract modern art, Wassily Kandinsky exploited the evocative interrelation between color and form to create an aesthetic experience that engaged the sight, sound, and emotions of the public. He believed that total abstraction offered the possibility for profound, transcendental expression and that copying from nature only interfered with this process. Highly inspired to create art that communicated a universal sense of spirituality, he innovated a pictorial language that only loosely related to the outside world, but expressed volumes about the artist's inner experience. His visual vocabulary developed through three phases, shifting from his early, representative canvases and their divine symbolism to his rapturous and operatic compositions, to his late, geometric and biomorphic flat planes of color. Kandinsky's art and ideas inspired many generations of artists, from his students at the Bauhaus to the Abstract Expressionists after World War II.  SOURCE- theartstory.org

Wassily Kandinsky 'Cossacks' Artwork

Cossacks 1910-1 Wassily Kandinsky 1866-1944 Presented by Mrs Hazel McKinley 1938 http://www.tate.org.uk/art/work/N04948

As a group, we decided to choose Kandinsky's 'Cossacks' as the piece of art to base our video essay on. The caption 'what emotion do you feel when you think of a colour?' was particularly thought-provoking for us, all especially after learning that the artist, Wassily Kandinsky, was a synaesthete and inspired each of us to think about the challenge of portraying this 'blending of the senses' in a piece of moving image.

Cossack[kos-ak, -uh k]

noun 1.
(especially in czarist Russia) a person belonging to any of certain groups of Slavs living chiefly in the southern part of Russia in Europeand forming an elite corps of horsemen.(http://www.dictionary.com/browse/cossack)

Kandinsky's 'Cossacks' was painted in 1910–1 when he was around 45 years old, during a transitional period in Russia. He believed that through his abstract works such as this, he could portray spiritual and emotional values, using colour and lines, although this piece supposedly related directly to a point  in his life (it is interesting to note that this piece was formerly called 'Battle'). Kandinsky suggests that Cossacks is a snapshot of his view of Moscow during this revolutionary period, and each part of the painting seemingly represents different objects that he saw at this time. For example, the Russian cavalrymen in tall orange hats in the foreground of the painting, or the two horses rearing up against each other with interlocking legs. The underlying tone of conflict and violence is apparent in the piece, through the use of clashing diagonal lines and unsettling assymetry. We assume that Kandinsky's trait of being a synaesthete also influenced this text significantly, as many the abstract elements, which do not clearly relate to particular objects, can be assumed to have stemmed from Kandinsky's other senses. For instance, the rainbow may represent a collection of sounds of smells that he experienced.