Three stills from “The Deprived Eye part I: Spot and Slit” (2006), DVD 10.50 min
Part one and two of “The Deprived Eye” (2006) take scientific experiments on visual memory as their departure. Part I (“Spot and Slit”) is the account of an experiment conducted by scientists Torsten Wiesel and David Hubel, as they teamed up in 1958 to study the visual processing in kittens. By projecting spots and slits onto a screen in front of the cat, they could look into its eye and follow the trace of the visual impulse to where it was being reassembled and subsequently stored.
The sequel “Do you see the same blue as me?” makes free associations of a later experiment by Nobel Prize winner Leon Cooper in which a computer network was programmed to see like a cat. My awakening to these strange experiments inspired the black and white shapes of the double-screen 3D-animation. Through a voice-over we follow the computerized cat Jodi’s liberation from her creator.
“The Deprived Eye part II: Do you see the same blue as me?” (2006), 2-channel 3D-animation, 5.45 min (animator: Nico Knudsen)
Installation view from Montevideo Institute for Time Based Art, Amsterdam, 2006