Statement on Neuroesthetics 01/06/13 02:31

home publications journal prof. zeki's events news art links

blog

statement on
neuroesthetics
What is art, why has it been such a conspicuous
feature of all societies, and why do we value it so
much? The subject has been discussed at length
without any satisfactory conclusion. This is not
surprising. Such discussions are usually conducted
without any reference to the brain, through which all
art is created, executed and appreciated. Art is a
human activity and, like all human activities, including
morality, law and religion, depends upon, and obeys,
the laws of the brain. We are still far from knowing the
neural basis of these laws, but spectacular advances in
our knowledge of the visual brain allows us to make a
beginning in studying the neural basis of visual art.

The first step in this enquiry is to define the function of

the brain and that of art. Many functions can be
ascribed to both. One overall function, common to
both, makes the function of art an extension of the
function of the brain: the acquisition of knowledge, an
activity in which the brain is ceaselessly engaged. Such
a definition naturally steeps us in a deeply philosophical
world, of wanting to learn how we acquire knowledge,
what formal contribution the brain makes to it, what
limitations it imposes and what neural rules govern the
acquisition of all knowledge. This catalogue is not much
different from that outlined by Immanuel Kant in his
monumental Critique of pure Reason, save that Kant
spoke exclusively in terms of the mind. And since the
problem of knowledge is a principal problem of
philosophy, it should also not surprise us that the great
philosophers, from Plato onwards, have devoted
significant parts of their work to discussions of art,
through which knowledge is gained and imparted.

Because knowledge has to be acquired in the face of

constantly changing conditions, mutability is the
cornerstone of the great philosophies of the West and
East. But it is also the key problem for the brain in its
quest for knowledge and for art, whose object,
Tennessee Williams once said, was "to make eternal
the desperately fleeting moment." Neural studies are
increasingly addressing the question of how the brain
achieves this remarkable feat. The characteristic of an
efficient knowledge-acquiring system, faced with
permanent change, is its capacity to abstract, to
emphasize the general at the expense of the particular.
Abstraction, which arguably is a characteristic of every
one of the many different visual areas of the brain,
frees the brain from enslavement to the particular and
from the imperfections of the memory system. This
remarkable capacity is reflected in art, for all art is
abstraction. John Constable wrote that "the whole
beauty and grandeur of Art consists... in being able to
get above all singular forms, particularities of every

http://neuroesthetics.org/statement-on-neuroesthetics.php Pgina 1 de 2
Statement on Neuroesthetics 01/06/13 02:31

kind [by making out] an abstract idea... more perfect

than any one original." He could have been describing
the functions of the brain, for the consequence of the
abstractive process is the creation of concepts and
ideals. The translation of these brain-formed ideals onto
canvas constitutes art.

Art of course, belongs in the subjective world. Yet

subjective differences in the creation and appreciation
of art must be superimposed on a common neural
organization that allows us to communicate about art
and through art without the use of the spoken or
written word. In his great requiem in marble at St.
Peter's in Rome, Michelangelo invested the lifeless body
of Christ with infinite feeling - of pathos, tenderness,
and resignation. the feelings aroused by his Piet are
no doubt experienced in different ways, and in varying
intensity, by different brains. But the inestimable value
of variable subjective experiences should not distract
from the fact that, in executing his work, Michelangelo
instinctively understood the common visual and
emotional organization and workings of the brain. That
understanding allowed him to exploit our common
visual organization and arouse shared experiences
beyond he reach of words.

It is for this reason that the artist is in a sense, a

neuroscientist, exploring the potentials and capacities
of the brain, though with different tools. How such
creations can arouse aesthetic experiences can only be
fully understood in neural terms. Such an understanding
is now well within our reach. The first step is to
understand better the common organization of our
visual and emotional brains, before we can even
proceed to enquire into the determinants of neural
variability. But there is little reason to doubt that a
study of variability, of how a common visual activation
can arouse disparate emotional states, will constitute
the next giant step in experimental studies of the visual
brain.

In such a study neuroscientists would do well to exploit

what artists, who have explored the potentials and
capacities of the visual brain with their own methods,
have to tell us in their works. Because all art obeys the
laws of the visual brain, it is not uncommon for art to
reveal these laws to us, often surprising us with the
visually unexpected. Paul Klee was right when he said,
"Art does not represent the visual world, it makes
things visible." We hope that the enormous
international enthusiasm that a study of the neural
basis of aesthetic experience has generated will prove
an effective catalyst in encouraging the neural study of
other human activities that may seem remote from the
general discipline of neurobiology. It is only by
understanding the neural laws that dictate human
activity in all spheres - in law, morality, religion and
even economics and politics, no less than in art - that
we can ever hope to achieve a more proper
understanding of the nature of man.

Semir Zeki

http://neuroesthetics.org/statement-on-neuroesthetics.php Pgina 2 de 2