The mystery of the pineal gland, in ancient medicine, the area of visual consciousness of the human brain.  We explore the question of visual culture, why art has been predominately visual in the West.  

Is the pineal gland the organ that generates our orientation to the visual?  Ren? Descartes believed this to be true.

Descartes wrote in Passions of the Soul,that the pineal was the "seat of the soul". He also postulated a direct connection between the eyes and the pineal gland by means of "strings" in the brain. Also that the gland acted as an interpreter, indeed the chief interpreter of vision. Not only did the gland operate as an interpreter but it also directed the muscles to respond to objects in the visual field. This was done, Descartes believed, through the flow of humours passing through hollow tubes between the gland and the muscles.

The viewers are presented  with an installation in a store front window.  The focus of the installation is a large painting, a diagram of the location of the pineal gland.  A monitor playing video footage of an autopsy is turned away from the viewer, towards the painting, so that the viewer can only see the footage at an angle or as a reflection in the painting.  Text on a sign describes a near mystical relationship to the search for the pineal gland, as a metaphor for the search for consciousness literally instribed on the human body. 

Medium:  painting, gold leaf, video footage, television monitor, pedestal, signage

Date:  1993

 Image source:  diagram by Descartes