
What art can teach us about the brain - tokenadult
http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post.cfm?id=why-so-many-artists-have-lazy-eyes-2010-06-04
======
ANH
Anecdotal, but: My wife was born with limited forward vision in one eye and it
has become "lazy" as a result. She always seemed to have a knack for
representing physical objects on the 2D plane. She's recently begun spending
serious amounts of time oil painting and her work continually impresses me,
all the more so for her lack of formal training. We've theorized that her lack
of depth perception facilitates the mapping from reality to canvas, so I'm
willing to believe this research.

------
Groxx
I've _got_ to remind myself to _not_ read comments on any random website.

An interesting idea, and it does make sense to me that being stereoblind may
be an advantage for 2D artists. Just watch anyone trying to draw with proper
perspective for the first time, they usually _dramatically_ skew basic angles
until they learn to see what it _looks_ like, not what it _is_. Anyone who
naturally has a less-strong sense of 3D would likely find this easier, because
it's closer to how they see the world anyway.

------
wazoox
I must be a great artist, because I never ever saw anything in these godamm'd
"magic eye" images. :)

------
albertcardona
_line drawings are "not something we've evolved to be able to understand," he
said, but rather, people in all cultures—and even babies and monkeys—can
understand a simple line drawing._

 _the metaphor is often more understandable than the real thing._

Finally a possible explanation as for why Mickey Mouse cartoons are "better"
than realistic 3D animation movies.

~~~
RodgerTheGreat
Scott McCloud discusses this extensively in chapter 2 of "Understanding
Comics: The Invisible Art." His general thesis is that detailed images that
approach or achieve photorealism are close to the way we understand and
experience the world around us and in turn how we view other people. Highly
"iconic" simplified line drawings and cartoons, on the other hand, are closer
to our internal representation of ourselves. The result is that we often find
it easier to empathize with cartoons than realistic images.

~~~
lionhearted
Great comment, thanks for that. I've been meaning to read some Scott McCloud
for a while, but my reading list is pretty long and it never bubbles up to the
top. Can you recommend any articles you've seen online that are pretty good,
or any insights by McCloud you found really fascinating or counterintuitive?

~~~
ggruschow
His work isn't just words. Just go through it. It's easy.

