The Eye's Mind: the Visual Imagination, Neuroscience and the Humanities

The visual imagination is one of the most powerful human capacities. It plays a vital role in many fields, from art and literature to religion and science.

Many fields of culture, especially art, but also literature, religion and science, rely on the visual imagination. Its importance for our mental life has long made it a subject of interest to philosophers and it has been studied by psychologists, cognitive scientists, and now neuroscientists. This conference, which is the culmination of the UK Arts and Humanities Research Council-funded research project, "The Eye's Mind. The Visual Imagination and its Role in Culture", will for the first time bring together specialists in all these areas with a view to laying the foundations for a new integrated understanding of this vital human capacity.

To achieve this challenging goal the organizers seek proposals from junior and senior scholars in any relevant field to join the present panel of keynote speakers, who include Paul Broks (psychology), John Onians (art history), Joel Pearson (neuroscience) and Adam Zeman (neurology), in presenting their research. Proposals may be historical or theoretical and may engage with a broad category or focus on a case study.

Potential presenters should submit a 250 word abstract to m.mackisack[at]exeter.aca.uk indicating whether platform or poster presentation is preferred.

For more information about the conference and the Eye's Mind project write to j.onians[at]uea.ac.uk or visit the conference website.