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

The New York Times Opinion Essay, Take a Bow. Madonna - by Mary Gabriel 8/15/2023, Zettel 141

Madonna is a cultural wrecking ball who has dared to be everything - performer, songwriter, producer, actor, director, children’s book author, muse - at a time when women were encouraged to stick to one lane. She has broken through social barriers, too, using her words and her work to confront the music industry, Hollywood, the Taliban, the Putin regime and the Vatican, to name just a few of her adversaries, over sexisum, misogyny, racism, homophobia, and hypocrisy. Because she is a woman and a popstar, critics generally dismiss her political statements as opportunistic grandstanding. But young people looking toward a future that seems closed to them see past that criticism. The novelist Sonich Kamal was introduced to Madonna’s music as a child while living in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. She said Madonna represented “pure, unadulterated, raw, sextual liberation” and hope: “hope that sexy girls did not necessarily die bad deaths, hope that sexy girls could rule the world. And do.” - The New York Times Opinion Essay, Take a Bow. Madonna - by Mary Gabriel 8/15/2023, Zettel 141

Dr. Akira Miyawaki, New York Times, Sunday 8/27/2023, Planting Tiny Forests and Yielding Big Benefits, by Cara Buckley, Zettel 145

The forest is the root of all life, it is the womb that revives our biological instincts, that deepens our intelligence and increases our sensitivity as human beings - Dr. Akira Miyawaki, New York Times, Sunday 8/27/2023, Planting Tiny Forests and Yielding Big Benefits, by Cara Buckley, Zettel 145

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

Reductionism in ART and Brain Science, by Eric Kandel, page 143, Zettel 132

Modern abstract art was predicated on two major advances: the liberation of form and the liberation of color. The Cubists, led by Georges Braque and Pablo Picasso, liberated form. Since then, modern art has often represented the artist’s subjective vision and state of mind rather than a naturalistic illusion of form based on the outside world. In the modern era it was largely Henri Matisse who liberated color, freeing it from form and thereby demonstrating that colors and color combinations can exert unexpectedly profound emotional effects. Once color was no longer determined by form, a color that might have seemed “wrong” in a particular figurative context would actually be right, because it was used to convey the artist’s inner vision, not to represent a particular object. Moreover, the separation of color from form is consistent with what we know about the anatomy and physiology of the prime visual system: That is form, color, movement, and depth are analyzed separately in the cerebral cortex. - Reductionism in ART and Brain Science, by Eric Kandel, page 143, Zettel 132

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

Reductionism in Art and Brina Science, Eric Kandel, pg 101, Zettel 120

..it was Pollock who, according to even to de Kooning, “really broke the ice.” Pollock proved to be by far, the strongest personality of his generation. As de Kooning put it: “Every so often, a painter has to destroy painting. Cezanne dd it. Picasso did it with Cubism. Then Pollock did it. He busted our idea of a picture all to hell. Then there could be new paintings again. (Galenson 2009) - Reductionism in Art and Brina Science, Eric Kandel, pg 101, Zettel 120