Neuroarthistory: From Aristotle and Pliny to Baxandall and Zeki - Hardcover

Onians, John

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0300126778 ISBN 13: 9780300126778

Publisher: Yale University Press, 2008

Synopsis

This provocative book offers a fascinating account of neuroarthistory, one of the newest and most exciting fields in the human sciences. In recent decades there has been a dramatic increase in our knowledge of the visual brain. Knowledge of phenomena such as neural plasticity and neural mirroring is making it possible to answer with a new level of precision some of the most challenging questions about both the creative process and the response to art. Exploring the writings of major thinkers (among them Montesquieu, Burke, Kant, Marx and Freud), and leading art historians (including Pliny, Winckelmann, Ruskin, Pater, Gombrich and Baxandall), as well as artists such as Alberti and Leonardo and scientists from Aristotle to Zeki, John Onians shows how an understanding of the neural basis of the mind contributes to an understanding of all human behaviors-including art.

About this title

Product Description:

Neuroarthistory There has been increase in both the quantity and the quality of our knowledge about the brain, especially the visual brain. Knowledge of phenomena such as neural plasticity and neural mirroring is making it possible to answer some of the questions about both creative process and response to art. This title offers an account of neuroarthistory.

Review:

`As an intellectual historian [Onians] is brisk, incisive and highly inquisitive ... Onians is also ... irrepressibly inventive.' --Julian Bell, Times Literary Supplement, 8th October 2009

About this edition

• Publisher: Yale University Press
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0300126778
• ISBN 13: 9780300126778
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 192