Lecture 2
Vision is not a mechanical recording of elements but rather the
apprehension of significant structural patterns. Rudolph Arnheim
‘The map is not the territory’, Alfred Korzybski
In " On exactitude in Science", Jorge Louis Borges describes the tragic
uselessness of the perfectly accurate, one-to-one map:
In time, those Unconscionable Maps no longer satisfied, and the Cartographers
Guild drew a Map of the Empire whose size was that of the Empire, coinciding
point for point with it. The following Generations, who were not so fond of the
Study of Cartography saw the vast Map to be Useless and permitted it to decay
and fray under the Sun and winters.
In the Deserts of the West, still today, there are Tattered Ruins of the Map,
inhabited by Animals and Beggars; and in all the Land there is no other Relic of
the Disciplines of Geography.
We will discuss :

The nature of human vision. Peculiarities of human eye and psychophysical structure. The role
of the amygdala and the cortex.

Visual perception as a construct.

Gestalt theory of visual perception and its application.
Read John Berger ‘Ways of Seeing’ Chapter 1
You are expected to be ready for written response to earlier lectures and readings in every class