The Story of Art, E.H. Gombrich, Page 544, Zettel 152

…in all the struggles and gropings there was one thing he was prepared to sacrifice if need be: the conventional ‘correctness’ of outline. He (Cezanne) was not out to distort nature; but he did not mind very much if it became distorted in some minor detail provided this helped him to obtain the desired effect….he hardly realized that this example of indifference to ‘correct drawing’ would start a landslide in art. - The Story of Art, E.H. Gombrich, Page 544, Zettel 152

How to be an Artist, Jerry Saltz, Page 76, Zettel 150

If you think that all art should be like High Renaissance painting, or like van Gogh, Eva Hesse, or Basquiat, think again. Human beings are hardwired to crave change. The universe is expanding; so are we, and so is art. Which doesn’t mean it’s getting better, or worse, only that all art was once contemporary art, in conversation with its time. yours is, too. Every choice you make - should serve not nostalgia, but your visceral present. You are an artist of modern life. That personal, specific urgency is what finds every successful work of art. - How to be an Artist, Jerry Saltz, Page 76, Zettel 150

The Story of Art, E.H. Gombrich Page 154, Zettel 148

The great artists of subsequent periods had made one discovery after another which allowed them to conjure up a convincing picture of the visible world, but none of them had seriously challenged the conviction that each object in nature has its definite fixed form and colour which must be easily recognizable in a painting. It may be said, therefore, that Manet and his followers brought about a revolution in the rendering of colours which is almost comparable with the revolution in the representation of forms brought about by the Greeks. They discovered that, if we look at nature in the open, we do not see individual objects each with its own colour but rather a bright medley of tints which blend in our eye or really in our mind. - The Story of Art, E.H. Gombrich Page 154, Zettel 148

Reductionism in Art and Brain Science page 42, Zettel 147

Some birds, insects, and fish have photoreceptors that respond to the ultraviolet light (shorter wave lengths than humans can see), and some snakes, insects; and vampire bats have receptors that can respond to infrared radiations or heat (longer wavelengths than humans can see). Certainly those animals can see spectral “colors” that we cannot and their perceptions are presumably different from ours - Reductionism in Art and Brain Science page 42, Zettel 147

Reductionism in Art and Brain Science page 185, Zettel 143

To be abstracted is to be at some distance from the material world. It is a form of local exaltation but also, sometime, of disorientation, even disturbance. Art at its most powerful can induce such a state, perhaps most potently. - Nancy Princenthal, New York art critique - Reductionism in Art and Brain Science page 185, Zettel 143

Reductionism in Art and Brain Science page 184, Zettel 142

While abstract paintings that appeal to our imagination call into play the brain’s top-down processing mechanism, figurative paintings that appeal to us call into play the default network of the brain. The default network, which was discovered in 2001 by Marcus Raichle (Raichle et al. 2001), consist primarily of the three brain regions: the medial temporal lobe, which is involved in memory: the posterior cingulate cortex, which is concerned with evaluating sensory information; and the medial prefrontal cortex, which is concerned with theory of mind - that is with distinguishing between another person’s mind, his or her aspirations and goals, and one’s own mind…recent studies suggest that the default network is most active during high aesthetic experience in art. (Edward Vesesel Nava Ravin, and Gabriella Starr) This intriguing finding suggests that since activation of the default network is related to our sense of self, its activation in response to art enables our perception of painting to interact with mental processes related to the self, possibly affecting them and even being incorporated into them. This line of thought is consistent with the idea that a person’s taste in art is linked to his or her sense of identity - Reductionism in Art and Brain Science page 184, Zettel 142

Reductionism in Art and Brain Science, Eric Kandel page 165, Zettel 137

Katz introduced a new reductionist concept into figurative art: his paintings have a flat background and lack of conventional perspective. In addition, he stressed pictorial values over narrative. He explained that “style and appearance are the thing that I’m more concerned about than about what something means. I’d like to have the style be the content, meaning, emptied of content.” (Strand 1984) - Reductionism in Art and Brain Science, Eric Kandel page 165, Zettel 137

Reductionism in Art and Brain Science, Erick Kandel page 179, Zettel 139

Thus the reason art pases such an enormous challenge to the beholder is that it teaches us to look at art - and, in a sense, at the world - in a new way. Abstract art dares our visual system to interpret an image that is fundamentally different from the kind of images our brain has evolved to reconstruct. - Reductionism in Art and Brain Science, Erick Kandel page 179, Zettel 139

Reductionism in Art and Brain Science, Erick Kandel page 179, Zettel 140

The art historian Jack Flam (2014) refers to this aspect of abstraction as “a new claim on truth”, By dismantling perspective; abstract art requires our brains to come up with a new logic of bottom-up processing. - Reductionism in Art and Brain Science, Erick Kandel page 179, Zettel 140

Reductionism in ART and Brain Science, by Eric Kandel, page 144, Zettel 133

Our brain processes different colors as having distinct emotional characteristics, but our reaction to the colors varies, depending upon the context in which we see them and our mood. Thus, unlike spoken language, which often has an emotional significance regardless of context, color is open to a great deal more top-down processing. As a result, the same color can mean different things to different people and to the same person in different contexts. - Reductionism in ART and Brain Science, by Eric Kandel, page 144, Zettel 133

New York Times Arts, July 18, 2023. For Some Films, Go Big or Go Home, Many fans will be doing whatever it takes to see ‘Oppenheimer’ projected in IMAX 70 mm, by Marc Tracy, Zettel 131

“I have to believe I wouldn’t care about as much if it didn’t have an emotional effect,” (Christopher) Nolan said. “There’s a favorite tactic of studio executives, he added, “which is to say, Well, at the end of the day, isn’t it all about story? To which you say, Well, no, otherwise we would be distributing audio books or radio plays. In the last analysis, it is not all about story. It’s about the moving image, it’s about cinematic storytelling, and the greatest movies made could only be films” - New York Times Arts, July 18, 2023. For Some Films, Go Big or Go Home, Many fans will be doing whatever it takes to see ‘Oppenheimer’ projected in IMAX 70 mm, by Marc Tracy, Zettel 131

Chaz Firestone, cognitive scientist, Johns Hopkins University. The New York Times, July 18, 2023. Silence Is a ‘Sound’ that can be heard, by Bethany Brookshire, Zettel 130

… People perceive silence as its own type of “sound”, not just as a gap between noises…”silence is the experience of time passing…an auditory experience of pure time”...”if silence is “not really a sound, and yet it turns out that we can hear it, then evidently, hearing is about more than just sounds.” - Chaz Firestone, cognitive scientist, Johns Hopkins University. The New York Times, July 18, 2023. Silence Is a ‘Sound’ that can be heard, by Bethany Brookshire, Zettel 130

Reduction in Art and Brain Science, by Eric Kandel, page 130, Zettel 129

As (Agnes) Martin put it, Rothko “reached zero so that nothing could stand in the way of truth.”....As Rothko was to say about these later works, “A painting is not a picture of an experience. It is an experience.” - Reduction in Art and Brain Science, by Eric Kandel, page 130, Zettel 129

Reductionism in Art and Brain Science, by Erick Kandel page 130, Zettel 128

In focusing on color, Rothko was searching for a new style of abstraction that would link modern art forms that reach out to the infinite. To achieve this, he abandoned figuration and focused exclusively on the expressive power of large fields of color. His experiments inspired a number of artists to follow his lead, to free color from objective contexts, inhibit access to figurative associations, and make it a subject of its own.  In a way, Rothko succeeded in achieving what biologists, including biologists of perception and memory, try to do with reductionist science. - Reductionism in Art and Brain Science, by Erick Kandel page 130, Zettel 128

John Rohrbach, preface of “In the American West” Richard Avedon, Zettel 125

…Instead of the staged explorations of artifice delivered by Cindy Sherman, he delivers the results of a heartfelt improvised dance between photographer and sitter where landscape comes projected through clothing and time is revealed in every blemish and fold of skin….Together, the photographer and his subjects had succeeded in delivering piercing looks at the wear of life’s struggles. - John Rohrbach, preface of “In the American West” Richard Avedon, Zettel 125

Reductionism in Art and Brain Science, by Erick Kandel, page 126, Zettel 124

Rothko saw such reductionism as necessary: “The familiar identity of things has to be pulverized in order to destroy the finite associations with which our society increasingly enshrouds every aspect of our environment” (ROss 1991). Only by pushing the limits of color, abstraction, and reduction, he argued, can the artist create an image that librates us from conventional associations with color and form and allows our brain to form new ideas, associations, and relationships - and new emotional responses to them. - Reductionism in Art and Brain Science, by Erick Kandel, page 126, Zettel 124

Reductionism in Art and Brain Science” by Erick Kandel, page 115, Zettel 123

Thus what abstract artists contend - and abstract art itself bears out - is that an impression, a sensory stimulation of the retina, is merely a spark for associative recall. The abstract painter does not attempt to provide pictorial detail, but rather to create conditions that enable the viewer to complete the picture based on his or her own unique experience. Legend has it that upon viewing a sunset painted by Turner, a young woman remarked, “I never saw a sunset like that, Mr. Turner,” to which Turner replied, “Don’t you wish you could, madam?”  - Reductionism in Art and Brain Science” by Erick Kandel, page 115, Zettel 123

Dostoevsky, A Writer in His Time, Joseph Frank page 57, Zettel 136

“To know nature, the soul, god, love … These are known by the heart, not the mind.” Dostoevskey argues that thought cannot unriddle the mystery of creation because “mind is a material faculty,” and as such is not in touch with transcendental truth. “Mind is an instrument, a machine, moved by the fire of the soul.” It is the soul that is the true medium for attaining the highest knowledge, for ”if the goal of knowledge is love and nature, this opens up a clear field for the heart.” Poetry is thus just as much a medium of knowledge as philosophy because “ the pet in the transport of inspiration, unriddles god.” - Dostoevsky, A Writer in HIs Time, Joseph Frank page 57, Zettel 136