5. Form as registered by the brain.

Part of an essay on Vermeer, brain channels, neural stimulus, visual perception and art appreciation

A 20,000-word essay on the interface between the fields of Vermeer, Art History and cognitive science, neuroscience and neuresthetics, psychology of perception, art psychology,

written by Vermeer specialist, art historian Drs. Kees Kaldenbach, Amsterdam.

Chapters:

1) Foreword
2) Introduction and terminology. houding, perception of reality, realism, illusionism and trompe l’oeil
3) Understanding Vermeer’s Perception of Reality; a Discussion of Characteristics
4) Brain and colour
5) Form as registered by the brain
6) Facial recognition, depth, movement, fine vs broad
7) Using this knowledge in studying and appreciating Vermeer
8) Workshop matters, Painters’ Supplies, Palette, The fijnschilder style versus the loose style, fourteen Qualities listed by Philips Angel
9) Naturalness, enticing the viewers
10) Delft artists influencing Vermeer
11) Vermeers Early, Middle, Late period. Camera Obscura
12) Vermeer’s World of Interiors: a Reality or a Construction
13) Landmark Vermeer literature (in print on paper form)
14) Digital Art History Studies and Presentations on Questions - on Perception of Reality in Vermeer Paintings
15) External CD-Rom, DVD, film material on Vermeer
16) Selected Bibliography

Updated June 9, 2016. Updated 15 February 2017.

3.2.2. Form

The next main separate visual multitasking area in the human brain as indicated by Zeki is form. A major part of the human brain is working on the sense of sight and a large section in the back part of the human brain is devoted to receive neurological pulses, resulting in making perceptual sense of what we perceive as form. As one part of observing form, we perceive either the angle of a line or the direction of a movement along this line if there is any such movement. This cortical activity aids the brain in its continuous search for constancy and essentials in the ever-changing outer world.

Gregory writes of the close kinship between colour and form:
“It is an interesting question how colour generally remains ‘registered’ to luminance contours, or edges, though sometimes colour does ‘bleed’ through gaps. Pictures with colour contrast but no brightness contrast look very peculiar.”[1]
One may actually observe this effect in looking - during hours of darkness - at commercial neon signs in dark blue, whose colour seems to overstep the boundary of the actual neon tube.
The mapping of the form-sensitive areas of the brain has been determined by neurosurgeons. By entering an extremely thin probe electrode into live test persons, and asking them to report their inner experiences, exact areas involved in form perception have been pinpointed.
As indicated, quite large and complex areas of the human brain are specialized in responding to form. These many billions of cells are grouped in orderly columns of cells, each cell or small group of cells sensitive to just one particular trigger relayed by nerve cells from the retina. One small group of cells may be electrically fired by observing a vertical shape like this |, the next group of cells is fired by a shape slightly tilting to the right /, the next one by a shape tilting even more until a horizontal line is seen – etcetera, the row continuing to tilt further to the right, full circle around an imaginary clock. Each cell is connected by its own neural pathway to the retina and responds to lines projected on the retina, caused by objects in the outer world. Actually there are specialized types of columns. Some columns are geared for stillness and constancy, others respond to movement in just one direction along the given axis line. Cells in yet another column are triggered by movement in just the opposite direction.
Thus the nerve triggered by a permanent line slanted like this / responds enthusiastically when ‘recognizing’ such a line, by firing rapid electrical pulses; and in another column the cells specialized in / respond to movement from lower left to upper right whereas another cell in another column is triggered by exactly the opposite movement. In this way a retinal image causes enthused firing by single cells pre-set to respond to particular visual stimuli. Strangely enough there seem to exist no sets of cells, which are triggered by rounded forms. These rounded forms may be broken up mentally in a series of very short straight elements with progressive degrees of tilt.
The large brain section responding to properties of linear form and design does also respond to general distribution of light and dark shapes. The active brain receives retinal data and scans and seeks for significant patterns between light areas and dark areas.
From the time of antiquity onwards, fine art painters have been aware of the importance of this phenomenon. In Vermeer paintings a quiet dance of geometry is performed by rectangular objects within the composition. These rectangles, which represent either maps, cupboards, window frames or paintings-within-paintings often constitute a strong and binding formal element within the composition.

Sometimes Vermeer uses a high contrasts within his paintings. A startlingly high key in both the luminous background contrasted with the darker human figures is obvious both in The Officer and the Laughing Girl (Frick, NYC) and the Lady Standing at the Virginal (National Gallery, London). Both of these paintings show main human figures against an evenly lit luminous background. This set-up, quite unusual within Dutch painting, or indeed any school of painting, would normally put the painter in a position of disadvantage in working out the light and colour values within a composition.[2]

In Vermeer paintings light and dark masses are grouped in a simplified and extremely well distributed manner. Philip Hale feels this quality is akin to the Japanese design quality called notan, which Vermeer may have perceived in Japanese pottery and in upright room screens.[3] Hale recognizes a similarity in this quality of a sparse but highly effective distribution, balance, shape and rhythm of his dark and light planes.
This type of design, reaching for the spatial and formal essence is extremely well executed in Music Lesson (Queens Collection, London) and Lady Standing at Virginal (National Gallery, London), but not quite as perfect in Art of Painting / The Studio (Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna) which is however redeemed by the jewel-like still life quality of parts of the painting and its overall brilliant paint surface.[4]

Notes

[1] Gregory 1998: 71.
[2] One of the earliest examples I am aware of within the school of Dutch painting is a family group by Maarten van Heemskerck (1498-1574) (Museum Wilhelmshohe, Kassel) against a bright background.
[3] Hale 1937: 83.
[4] Hale 1937: 81.

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Written 2002-2003. Published online, July 17, 2011. Updated July 17, 2011.

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