Experience the Art of Neuroscience at the Annual Meeting
For the third year, the Art of Neuroscience exhibit at SfN’s annual meeting provides artists with a venue to share unique and interesting pieces inspired by the wonders of neuroscience. This year’s program will feature seven artists: three who have participated in the exhibit since its debut in 2012 and four new ones. Artists Lia Cook, Kathleen Childress, and Greg Dunn will be joined this year by Joni Seidenstein, Megan McGlynn, Audrius Plioplys, and Michele Banks in the largest installment of the exhibit to date.
The Art of Neuroscience exhibit at Neuroscience 2014 will be open on the L Street Bridge at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, November 15, through Wednesday, November 19.
About the Artists
Lia Cook began working with neuroscientists after she became intrigued by the different responses gallery visitors had to the same portrait in different media. Cook’s work examines data from preliminary research using EEG and fMRI to compare physical and emotional responses to human faces, photos, and weavings.
Greg Dunn has a PhD in neuroscience and uses his education to explore the fusion of art and science through designs in gold leaf. Dunn and his colleague Dr. Brian Edwards recently developed a new technique for creating handmade lithographs, called microetchings, designed to manipulate light and evolve based on the moving perspective of the viewer.
Kathleen Childress is the artist behind the Synapse series, a neuroscience-inspired collection of custom jewelry. The Synapse series sprang from a bold dopamine neuron on a silver cuff, designed for Childress’s neuroscientist sister, Anna Rose Childress, research associate professor in psychology and psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine. Childress now collaborates with researchers on custom pieces that express the essence of their science.
Joni Seidenstein creates art quilts featuring natural subjects. Her quilts capture the excitement conveyed by a scientific image and seek to inspire an emotional response in the viewer. Her collection of neuroscience-themed quilts includes an interpretation of the Josephson junction neurons as well as a quilt inspired by research on the processes of facial recognition.
Megan McGlynn uses the media of collage and sculpture to portray the complex architecture of human perception. She uses natural materials and traditional techniques to create sculptures and drawings that represent the connections between nature, science, and technology.
Audrius Plioplys has been a professional artist and a neurologist-neuroscientist for 35 years. Plioplys’ work transforms underlying images from previous photographic artworks into exotic forms much in the same way that memories transform visual impulses into neuronal web-works.
Michele Banks creates one of a kind watercolor paintings, collages, and scarves celebrating the world of science. Her work includes paintings and matching scarves inspired by the work of neuroscience pioneer Santiago Ramon y Cajal.
