Contents

List of figures

Series preface

Preface to the first edition

Preface to the second edition

1 Approaches to the neuropsychology of art

Introduction

Definitions and purpose of art

Why do humans create art?

Early beginnings of art production by humans

Beauty and its role in art and brain evolution

Art production and brain damage in established artists

Sensations, perception, and neuropsychology

Artistic depictions, brain, and neuropsychology

Color, art, and neuropsychology

Music and dance and the brain

Artistic creativity and the brain

Language and art

Language lateralization and disorders of language (aphasia)

Talent and sensory deficits as clues to neuropsychology of art

Neuroaesthetics: aesthetic reactions to art in the brain

Summary

Further readings

2 The effects of brain damage in established visual artists

Introduction

Art production following left hemisphere damage

Art production following right hemisphere damage

Slow brain diseases: progressive neurodegeneration

Neurofilament intermediate inclusions disease (NIFID)

Pick’s disease with semantic dementia

Effects of localized brain damage in literary artists

Effects of dementia on a literary artist

Other writers and visual artists

Dance choreography and the brain

Summary

Further readings

3 The eye and brain in artist and viewer: alterations in visionand color perception

Introduction

Human color vision and the retina

Specialized neural cells in the retina

Visual pathways and the two visual half-fields

Localization of color processing in the brain: effects of brain damage

Health status of the eyes in visual artists

Specific established artists with compromised vision

Summary

Further readings

4 Special visual artists: the effects of savant autism and slow brain atrophy on art production and creativity

Introduction

Untypical artists

Savant visual artists

Slow brain atrophy and art

Summary

Further readings

5 Musical art and brain damage I: established composers

Introduction

Composers and slow brain disease

Composers and localized damage due to stroke

Additional composers and brain damage

Neurological consequences in established composers

Summary

Further readings

6 Musical art and brain damage II: performing and listening to music

Introduction

Art of music and language

Amusia and the art of music

Music localization in the brain

Melodies and the role of musical training

Unilateral brain damage in trained musicians

The neuropsychology of singing

Brain representation of musicians’ hands

Music brain activation in fMRI and PET studies

Summary

Further readings

7 Artists and viewers: components of perception and cognition in visual art

Introduction

Art, perceptual constancy, and canonical views

Hemispheric categorization and perspective views in pictures

Unilateral damage and pictorial object recognition

Disembedding in pictures and the left hemisphere

Figure–ground and visual search in art works

Global–local, wholes, and details in visual art works

Unconscious influences on perception of art works

Right hemisphere specialization, representation of space, and art history

Depth perception in pictures

Convergent and linear perspective in the history of art

Summary

Further readings

8 Neuropsychological considerations of drawing and seeing pictures

Introduction

Frontotemporal dementia (FTD)

Art professor and Sabadel

Handedness in artists

Drawings and the parietal lobes

Drawings in neurological patients

Hemi-neglect and attention

Pictorial scenes: simultanagnosia

Scenes, eye movements, and the frontal eye fields

Summary

Further readings

9 Reactions to art works: beauty, pleasure, and emotions

Introduction

Beauty as an emergent property of art

Beauty and aesthetics

Neuroaesthetics: brain activity and art aesthetics

Pleasure and the reward system

Experiments on brain activity and aesthetics: some examples

Aesthetics, the oblique effect, and properties of the visual cortex

Left–right perception and aesthetic preference in pictures

Hemispheric aesthetic preference

The special case of faces: biological nature of beauty in faces

Painted portraiture

Beauty in colors: the film

Dancing and the brain s reactions to dance

Neuropsychology and emotional reactions to art

Summary

Further readings

10 Biology, human brain evolution, and the early emergence of art

Introduction

Biology and display of art

Visual arts

Origins of music in human brain evolution

Dance

Symbolic nature of art and language

Summary

Further readings

11 Further considerations: talent, creativity, and imagination

Introduction

Talent in art

Creativity in art

Neuropsychology of creativity

Art creativity and dementia

Language and artistic creativity: clues from FTD

Left hemisphere art and creativity: clues from savants with autism

Neurotransmitters and art creativity: clues from Parkinson s disease treatment

Imagery and imagination

Complexities of visual art

Summary

Further readings

12 Conclusion and the future of the neuropsychology of art

Lessons from brain damage in artists

Art in human existence

Clinical applications of art: art therapy

Uniqueness of the human brain: clues to art production

Convergence of evidence

The future of the neuropsychology of art

Glossary

References

Index