Walking Here and There:

1
Walking Here and There
An Art Science Collaboration
Vaughan Bell and Simon Pope
2
Lou Reeds Walk on the Wild Side Jackie
refers to Jackie Curtis, a cross-dressing regular
of Andy Warhols studio The Factory.
3
Jackie Curtis

• Heavy speed use led to probable amphetamine
  psychosis.
• Genuinely believed he was James Dean at times.

4
What is a delusion?

• The DSM defines a delusion as a belief that is
• False, based on incorrect inference about
  external reality.
• Firmly sustained, despite what almost everybody
  else believes...
• and despite what constitutes incontrovertible
  and obvious proof or evidence to the contrary
• The belief is not one ordinarily accepted by
  other members of the persons culture or
  subculture.

5
Criticisms

• Falsity Delusions may not be false (Jones, 1999)
  or even falsifiable (Young, 2000)
• Firmly sustained Conviction in delusional
  beliefs may vary day-to-day (Myin-Germeys et al,
  2001)
• Despite obvious evidence to the contrary Many
  normal beliefs show this pattern (Kuhn, 1962)
• Not held by culture or subculture People can
  form subcultures based around delusions (Bell et
  al., 2006).

6
Delusions as altered realities

• Despite the difficulties of adequately defining
  delusions it is important we understand the
  psychology and neuroscience of altered states in
  psychosis.
• Why would someone believe they are
• James Dean
• Living in 1st Century Rome
• Emperor of Antarctica and the left foot of God
• Dead
• Being controlled by an air loom

7
Illustrations of Madness
1st book-length case study used an artistic
interpretation
8
The Air Loom
9
Reduplicative Paramnesia

• Is the delusion that a place or location has been
  duplicated, existing in two or more places
  simultaneously
• or that it has been relocated to another site.

• First named by neurologist Arnold Pick in 1903.
• A patient insisted that she had been moved from
  Picks city clinic, to one she claimed looked
  identical but was in a familiar suburb.

10
Reduplicative Paramnesia

• It was later described in soldiers who had
  suffered traumatic brain injury
• who believed the military hospital was located
  in their home town.
• It was not studied seriously, however, until
  1976.
• Case description from Benson et al. (1976)

11
Neuropathology
Linked to coexisting frontal and right hemisphere
damage.
12
Neuropathology

• Damage to the right hemisphere could leave
  patients unable to maintain orientation owing to
  impaired visuospatial perception and visual
  memory
• While frontal lobe damage made it difficult to
  inhibit the false impressions caused by
  disorientation.

13
Cognitive Neuropsychology

• Aims to understand the normal mind and brain work
  by researching how it breaks down.
• Reduplicative paramnesia and other delusions are
  where the influence of memory on current
  experience has gone awry.
• They are, therefore, of interest to both
• A scientist interested in uncovering brain
  function.
• An artist interested in highlighting hidden
  relationships to our environment.

14
Gallery Space Recall

• More recently, Simon has included stronger
  influences of memory in his work.
• Gallery Space Recall asks questions about whether
  art is something internal or external to us
• by breaking down the usual experience of
  visiting a gallery by having your experience
  dictated by a memory.
• Whose artwork are you experiencing?
• Yours, your friends, Simons, the artist from a
  previous gallery or all of them?

15
Gallery Space Recall

• Gallery Space Recall also questions what extent
  our past memories influence our current
  experience of place by highlighting an anomalous
  experience.

So the person who has only visited Trafalgar
Square once in their life will have a memory of
the square that is tightly bound up with the
details specific to that event. The person who is
a regular visitor will have representations (a
template) of the square that are independent of
any one event, but may be common to many.
From Confabulation and the Control of
Recollection Burgess and Shallice (1996)