WEEK 7

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NEUROSCIENCE + ART

This week was spent discussing topics that fall under the umbrella of neuroscience and art. Professor Vesna covered many intriguing topics and ideas. She spoke about the conscious mind, the unconscious mind, dreams, and how drugs such as cocaine and LSD impact our brain. While I found the range of topics very interesting, I took a deeper interest into the ideas of dreams and how we dream.


Pawula, Sandra, et al. “The Neuroscience of Building a Resilient Brain.” The Best Brain Possible, 28 Aug. 2019, thebestbrainpossible.com/neuroscience-resilient-brain-stress/. 



Before talking about dreams, one thing I enjoyed learning about was the literal merging of art and neuroscience topics, particularly with Suzanne Anker’s MRI butterfly (Vesna). In the ‘fMRI Butterfly’, there are “15 seemingly unspecified and identical brain scans [that] are arranged in a grid […] and at [each] centre of each frame is an image of a butterfly, on each of which Anker superimposes a different reproduction of a Rorschach-test-type inkblots” (Frazetto, Anker). Her work creates conversation surrounding neuroimagery, and “underscores the non-univocal character of functional neuroimages and reminds us that these are end products of complex numerical data processing that involve intuition and interpretation on part of the scientist” (Frazetto, Anker).


 Anker, Suzanne. “Cerebral Spirits: Stalking the Self - Suzanne Anker, MRI Butterfly.” Suzanne Anker, suzanneanker.com/blog/2012/01/15/cerebral-spirits-stalking-the-self/. 



Looking into the ideas of the unconscious and dreams, I found it interesting to know that 95% of the time, our dreams are forgotten (Vesna). Additionally, Freud’s ideas surrounding that idea that the ability interpret the meaning of our dreams is the “royal road” to the unconscious is something I find very thought-provoking. His theories have me think about how we would be able to analyze our dreams in a way that would allow us to really understand our unconscious (Freud Museum London). Because as Professor Vesna said, while there is so much research surrounding dreams, we know so little (Vesna).  


Staff, City Mattress. “The Purpose of Dreams: What They Are, Why We Have Them, and How They Tell Us about Our Sleep.” City Mattress, www.citymattress.com/blogs/news/the-purpose-of-dreams-what-they-are-why-we-have-them-and-how-they-tell-us-about-our-sleep. 


The topic of dreams is something that always intrigues me, and I find myself trying to analyze dreams that I can recall after waking up.  Dreams are a very fascinating concept because of their difficulty to grasp — we mostly have dreams that apply to our own lives, and when we do have the opportunity to try to understand it, we are often left having to “find the significance of that imagery on” our own (Newsweek). 


This week’s topics serve as an introduction into the complex world of our mind, body and also demonstrates how art can help to advance and support discoveries in neuroscience.



Works Cited

Edition, Newsweek Special. “How to Control Your Unconscious Mind.” Newsweek, Newsweek, 24 May 2016, www.newsweek.com/only-dreams-430107. 

Frazzetto, Giovanni, and Suzanne Anker. “Neuroculture.” Nature Reviews Neuroscience, vol. 10, no. 11, 2009, pp. 815–821., doi:10.1038/nrn2736. 

Freud Museum London. “The Interpretation of Dreams.” Freud Museum London, 16 Mar. 2022, www.freud.org.uk/education/resources/the-interpretation-of-dreams/. 

Vesna, Victoria. Lecture I: Consciousness and Memory. May 2022. 

Vesna, Victoria. Lecture II: Neuroscience and Art Part II. May 2022. 





Comments

  1. john camposJune 4, 2022 at 12:28 PM

    Hello, I enjoyed the way that you chose to focus your blog post on dreams and the neuroscientific processes of dreaming. I also like how you highlighted the FMRI butterfly work and found it interesting how he incorporated Rorschach testing into it. I also like the idea of dreams as a royal road to the functionings of the unconscious mind. It is interesting how we always forget dreams unless we try to remember.

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