Curatorialist

I took a test when I was really young, I think in pre-school. Back in the 70’s they were always testing us for one thing or another. Among other optical illusion, this image was on the page, with the caption: “Which line is longer?”

I got it wrong. In fact, I got just about every question wrong on that test. All the other kids were a little older and wise to these kinds of visual puzzles and figured most of it out. I remember a couple kids and the moderator sitting around trying to explain to me why the two lines were the same size and I couldn’t get it. Couldn’t see it. Besides scarring me for life with mindfucks (another byproduct of the 70’s), it also began a fascination of the visual world. I remember later on spending hours watching a pencil refract as it entered a glass of water.

I also tripped out on the optical illusion of train tracks meeting in the distance. And then, of course, my magic stage (another time, maybe). In college, I started to really pay attention to the way the eyes see things. My 2D and 3D classes opened my mind and I got deep into theoretical views on how the eye sees the world: Gestalt theory, in particular, fascinated me to no end: the idea that objects appear different depending on their relation to other objects. I finally started to understand why my little brain couldn’t grasp the principles of those two lines.

The sad and beautiful truth of the matter is, our eyes don’t see the world accurately. Our view of everything is always relative to our position and other objects in our view, and that’s true for how we comprehend the world, too. It doesn’t make what we see, or think, wrong, it just makes it biased. I find that completely fascinating and now, rather than make me feel stupid, it only drives me to higher and higher vantage points from which to view things.

Newer, and even more incredible optical illusions are starting to pop up and I think it’s great. It alters your mind. It’s not necessarily about getting you to see the world differently, but to accept that you already are:

1. These spirals appear to have both blue and green swirls in them. In actuality, the blue and the green are the exact same color. It is the presence, or lack of presence, of orange that makes you see that color differently.

2. Spinning girl. If you stare long enough, you can see the girl spinning either clockwise or counterclockwise. In fact, there is no girl there (something we know intellectually, but our brains can’t tell our eyes that), just a two-dimensional animation. As our eyes struggle to make sense of it, we attribute three-dimensional rules to it that don’t really exist. Our brains just make up stuff that isn’t real and tell our brains to accept it. In this case, there’s an equal chance that you’ll see it as spinning one way as another and once you see it, it’s very hard to see it the other way. If our brains can do it that easily on a simple animation, doesn’t it become more clear how we do that over many other issues?

3. Audio illusion. In this test, watch the following video and try to discern the words being said. It’ll sound like “gaga” or “dada:”

No close your eyes and play it. The words will sound like “baba.” This is sort of the opposite effect of the previous one. It is the addition of a visual cue (mouth open) that prohibits us from accurately interpreting the initial consonant of that word. Again, an interesting life lesson about our minds’ ability to assimilate wrong information and make it seem right.