Category: visual stress

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colour environment vision visual stress

What the eye doesn’t see

This piece by Ryodi Ikeda : point of no return, a pulsating stroboscopic sound and light installation, appears to be monochrome. However images captured digitally reveal a more nuanced colour spectrum.

It is suggested that the human eye is capable of perceiving between 2 and 3 million colours, whereas birds, butterflies, fish and bees can see many more. Jennings explains that this is related to a difference in number of photoreceptors or cones. Humans with three cones are trichchromats whereas the birds and bees have four and are tetrachromats. Research on gender differences colour perception suggests that some women may also be tetrachromats. When contemplating the significant variety in our environments its intriguing to imagine what else might exist beyond our perception.

Categories
pattern perception visual stress

Avoid high contrast pattern

Guidance on accessible environments often refers to the need to avoid high contrast patterns in flooring that can appear moving or three dimensional for people with visual or cognitive impairments. The confusing optical impact of this flooring in a Camper shoe shop in Valencia gave me first hand experience of what this might feel like. Its a challenge to walk across this floor but the impression is also mesmerising.

Categories
aesthetics pattern perception vision visual stress

experiencing pattern

Can the power of images such as these that draw the viewer, and challenge our perception give us some insight into altered perceptions in dementia, and offer perhaps  a captivating rather than a disturbing  experience ?  It is often said that some people living with dementia experience pattern as 3-dimensional or moving, and therefore potentially disturbing. In Realistic Magic: Objects, Ontology and Causality, Andrew Morton describes the:” aesthetic dimension as a the causal dimension.. you are working directly with people’s optic nerve and field of vision..” He describes his experience of viewing the paintings of aboriginal painter Yukultji Nanpangati :” The gaze emanates from the force field of a Napangati painting. It gathers me into it’s disturbing, phantasmal unfolding of zigzagging lines and oscillating patches.”.. ” At a distance it looks like a woven mat of reeds or slender stalks, yellowed, sun baked, resting on top of some darker, warmer depth. A generous, relaxed, precise, careful yet giving, caring lineation made of some blobby dots. The warmth reminds me of Klee. The lines remind you of Bridget Riley. As you come close and begin to face the image it begins to play, to scintillate, to disturb the field of vision. It oscillates and ripples,..”