Contents Page

Abstract

Introduction

Conclusion -Kandinsky and cytowic

Abstract

Synesthesia may occur in a number of ways, it may be the result of natural body chemistry; it can result from chemical addition and also from sensory deprivation. Any combination of the five senses may be involved simultaneously. The most common combinations are of visual and audial senses called coloured hearing or chromesthesia, and in visual-images produced by taste. Because of the subjective nature of the synesthetic experience, and its association with emotional responses, it can be very difficult to distinguish between true synesthesia and association and metaphor. The inextricable subjective nature of synesthesia is something that has impeded the diagnosis and definition of synesthesia. The experience of synesthesia, as truly defined by neurologist and synesthestic researcher Richard E cytowic, has been the dog of various definitions and the experience itself being a true example of subjective perception. This not only makes synesthesia unexplorable by conceptual objective science alone, but it’s emotional and inherently human response is uncomforting to the modern paradigm in terms of the understanding of the perceptual human potential. Synesthesia goes against some of the mainstream neuroanatomy and psychology because the phenomenon of a synesthetic experience is not compartmentalized in the sense of classical neurology, much neurological based research into the actual experience of synesthesia (synesthestic experience) and its location in the brain has indicated that rather than being a spot were synesthesia occurs, it involves many areas of the brain simultaneously.

“It is popularly held that no brain cell is more than seven times removed from any other, so clearly all cells are in some sense connected” John Harrison. Synesthesia, The strangest thing, p14)

This being particularly within the limbic system (see fig 1) which is a very old area of the brain in evolutionary terms, this not only suggests that synesthesia involves wide spread cerebral activity during the sensation itself, but also that synesthesia may not be a evolutionary development but a perceptive faculty that has been with us since mans beginning.

(Fig 1) limbic system

 
As well as the neurology of the synesthestic experience, an example of the synesthestic sensation would be if I heard a low bass note from a piano, I would feel tall smooth columns, rough in texture at the bottom and reaching very high, lots of them spreading out and flowing up and down with the sustain of the note. The experience, in a physiological sense exists as a major process at a given time in the entire distributed neural system of the brain. The definition of synesthesia has been narrowed over time, and the general consensus is that synesthesia only occurs when the stimulation of one human sense e.g. vision, is accompanied by the perception of another human sense.
Things in the world around us are, in themselves, colourless, odourless and silent, but they have properties that determine our sensual response. For example, electromagnetic waves are perceived as images or colour, we experience vibration not as vibration but as sound, we sense chemicals not as chemicals but as tastes and smells, so these senses of taste, smell, sounds and colours are by-products of our cognition that are built from sensory experiences stimulated by the outside world.

By an object peculiar to a particular sense, I mean one that cannot be perceived by any other sense, and in respect of which no deception is possible. Thus colour is an object peculiar to sight, sound to hearing, and flavour to taste. Each sense judges the object peculiar to it and is never deceived as to the existence of the colour or sound that perceives it. (de anima Aristotle, cytowic the man who tasted shapes p85)

When we sense something, we do not isolate one sense from another, for instance if you pick up a cup of coffee you feel the texture of the cup, the temperature, you can smell the coffee and you see the cup, so the brain is taking all that information from the experience of holding a cup of coffee, and the many processes of perception bring the cup of coffee together as a whole, so this results in a unity from the simultaneous perception of the different qualities in an object. Because of this process of amalgamation, in which different sensory inputs are translated and interfaced with one another, it is possible that if one sense is missing such as sight, the brain diverts the information from the remaining senses, crossing them or emphasizing a particular one to build a more complete experience from the environment. This form of synesthesia has often been attributed to the blind. In this research document I will be examining Synesthesia’s impact upon and extrapolation by the artistic and scientific worlds from the 20th century onwards, and highlight the developments and future applications of synesthesia in art by looking at the complementary views supposed by the early 20^th century synesthestic artist Kandinsky, and the group the Blue Rider. I will compare those to the views of the modern synesthesia researcher and leading neurologist Richard Cytowic. And attempt to see how subjective and objective Research and different views of synesthesia have shaped the contrasting views held by Kandinsky and Cytowic, experiments with colour-organs, musical paintings and visual music will be looked into to uncover perceptual and emotional aspects of synesthesia to see how synesthesia could be applied to art and the future of synesthesia in the 21^st century.

Chapter 1

Born in Moscow 1866 and considered to be the father of abstraction, Wassily Kandinsky learned to play both the piano and cello at an early age, Kandinsky enrolled at the University of Moscow in 1886 to study law and social science. After he passed his examinations, he lectured at the Moscow Faculty of Law. He was not only a teacher but also wrote extensively on spirituality, a subject that remained with him and ultimately exerted much influence on his work. At the age of thirty, Kandinsky left Moscow and went to Munich to study life drawing, sketching and anatomy. Kandinsky’s work moved in a direction that was of much greater abstraction than that which was pioneered by the Impressionists. From 1903 onwards, his work was exhibited throughout Europe, and often caused controversy among the public, the art critics, and his contemporaries. He was an active participant in several of the most influential art movements of the 20th century, amongst them the Blue Rider which he founded along with his friend Franz Marc. Kandinsky continued to refine his art, both on canvas and in his theoretical writings. The goal of Wassily Kandinsky’s synesthestic experiments was to create compositions that touched the soul, and unified the senses. Much of Kandinsky work was not isolated to painting, but he also experimented with the fusion of different media, such as sound and vision, When he was young and throughout his life he displayed a fascination with the relationship between colours and sound, music and painting, as can be seen with the names of his paintings like "Improvisations", "Compositions” and "Impressions".

(Fig 2) Improvisation gorge 1914

In his painting untitled improvisation gorge 1914(see fig 2) we see a classic example of his method of abstraction, Kandinsky’s sensitivity to colour is very much apparent with a full spectrum of the colours juxtaposed by line and form, a blending of compositional elements and varied hues of colour, The application of synesthestic colour theory, which Kandinsky fully immersed himself in, gives rise to a language that Kandinsky helped define in painting, as set out in concerning the spiritual in art.

“It is clear that all I have said of these colours is very provisional and general, and so also are those feelings (joy, grief, etc) which have been quoted as parallels of the colours. For these feelings are only the material expressions of the soul. Shades of colour, like those of sound, are of a much finer texture and awake in the soul emotions to fine to be expressed in words.” (Kandinsky concerning the spiritual in art. P 41)

The very words he uses crystallizes the ideal of adding an extra dimension to his work by the means of using colour, line and form to depict sound in a non-objective manner, Or more precisely, tonality and the “feel” of the music. Kandinsky’s desire to evoke sound for people who looked at his work is evident in, (klangen 1912) and is an example of were he began to change from representation to non objective painting, throughout 1908-14 Kandinsky was shifting his focus from this and experimenting with a theoretical framework to painting that was based on organizational theory developed from the basic properties of form and colour. This prevalence, throughout Kandinsky’s painting career, of elements of visual language to describe sound, coupled with the emotional aspects of his response, reflects his long held belief that there was more to painting and art in general that just purely copying or representing something in the conventional sense of seeing, In the example of a poem below by Kandinsky, echoes of Kandinsky’s perspective and subjective experience of words or letters and his synesthesia is very much evident. We catch an interesting porthole through the eyes of Kandinsky and can understand how different researchers have realised Kandinsky’s synesthesia through his work, His expression of his perception, through his poetry is very reminiscent of letter based synesthesia, which is were letters may appear to have overlaid photisms of colour which act as a memory enhancement and adds a extra dimension to the 1d language of words, his emotional and subjective response to this, becomes recognizable in the poem below. The problem with determining his synesthesia experience validity is the fact that his emotions become deeply entangled with the synesthestic experience.

Once there was a big 3 - white on dark brown. Its top curve was exactly the same size as its bottom one. At least that’s what many people thought. And yet the top one was just a little, little, little bit bigger than the bottom one. This 3 always looked to the left- never to the right. And it also looked down a little bit, since the number only seemed to stand straight up. In reality, which wasn’t easy to see, the top leaned just a little, little, little bit to the left.

So the big 3 always looked to the left and just a tiny bit down. But then again maybe it was different. (Wassily Kandinsky p71 klangen/sounds)  

Kandinsky believed he could touch the soul of the viewer by creating a synesthestic quality about his work. He also places much emphasis on the role of the artist, in terms of self expression and the need to communicate the within, again this is an advance in the context of being an artist but does emotion have any relationship with synesthesia?

Chapter 2

Kandinsky’s emotional aspects of synesthesia

Emotion in intrinsically linked with synesthesia and for Kandinsky; colour brings about an emotional equivalent and an emotional response. And Kandinsky’s sensitivity to the subjective nature of experience is the realisation that synesthesia contributed to a deeper perceptual and aesthetic understanding of the basic elements of visual imagery and there deep relationship with sound and poetry. Every work chooses its own form and is subject to inner necessity alone. Every element of form has its absolute physical effect (=value); the construction chooses among these media is such a fashion as to turn absolute value to relative value, so that, for example, warm becomes cold and Sharpe dull.(Wassily Kandinsky sounds page 2)

Kandinsky’s romantic explanation of the in depth attributes of the simplest things was linked to his understanding of synesthesia as a connection to divinity. This perspective, was founded on his interest in the esoteric, in particular his sympathizing with the ideas of Madame Blavatsky and the theosophy movement. This is highlighted by the language he uses to express his limited knowledge of what synesthesia is. His understanding of synesthesia, by no means localized to his method of describing synesthesia with expressive terms was a way for Kandinsky to look beyond the cult of objectivity of the late 19th century thinking. It led Kandinsky to explore and pursue his technique of non-objective painting, This realisation that synesthesia contributed to a deeper perceptual and aesthetic understanding of the basic elements of visual imagery, sheds light on Kandinsky’s use of synesthesia as a sensory advantage i.e. using it to gain a different understanding from conventional perception. Was Kandinsky just trying to paint synesthesia or was he actively developing sensory fusion in visual language?

These factors of artistic extrapolation that Kandinsky utilizes from his emotional synesthestic Response, indicate that Kandinsky not only was seeking to distance himself from objective painting but that he also wanted in someway to express his synesthesia in painting, so employing synesthesia as the emotional and subjective tool that serves to mystify the synesthestic experience and to express the within, freeing himself from the chastity of objectiveness that so much fills the world in which Kandinsky lived.

But to a more sensitive soul the effect of colours is deeper and intensely moving. And so we come to the second main result of looking at colours: their psychic effect. They produce a corresponding spiritual vibration that the elementary physical impression is of importance. (Wassily Kandinsky, concerning the spiritual in art p24)

Kandinsky is clearly claiming his synesthesia experience to be psychic in origin, stating vibration to be the catalyst of his response to colour, this example reveals his colour and sound synesthesia (chromesthesia) and can give us much insight to his basic core belief of why he felt the things that he did when feeling a synesthestic experience. Because of his limited knowledge of the physiological and neurological dynamics of the synesthestic experience Kandinsky naturally took on some of the metaphysical thinking of esoteric theories that were prevalent in his time and expanded them within the context of art.

Chapter 3

In 1911 Kandinsky was pressured to resign as the chairman of Neue Kunstlervereinigung because his work was considered too abstract. Other members of the group such as Franz Marc and Alfred Kubin left with him and in that same year Kandinsky met the artists Paul Klee and Auguste Macke. With whom they formed Der Blaue Reiter. Their first exhibition was included with other prominent artists whose work they admired, such as Delaunay, Rousseau and Arnold Schonberg.

Der Blaue Reiter sought to emphasis good art from all places and times. From its members it demanded only that they express their inner selves rather than narrowly conform to one style. (Wassily Kandinsky concerning the spiritual in art pvii)

The blue rider was a group of artist and writers that explored the notion of a unified media, they were influenced by the composer Wagner and his concept of Gesamthunstwerk or total work of art, this notion of unifying media in which synesthesia is considered, could be a possible avenue for developing art in the 21^st century and has gathered subsequently more interest in the last 20 years by researchers of various different fields, but the Blue Rider group were the first artists in accepted art history to pioneer this idea. But how does this link to synesthesia? The notion of a unified artwork I think, is a very new development in terms of the entire history of art media, what Kandinsky and his fellow members of the blue rider effectively pursued was a technology of media that was a very hard conquest to complete, especially with the problem that they had only a limited view of what synesthesia really was in terms of its relationship to translating different mediums and uniting media, but there experiments built upon the previous foundations of past artistic and scientific theories and helped to validate the experience of synesthesia as a true condition that was based on a purely subjective experience alone.

Chapter 4

Cytowic’s approach to synesthesia is perhaps the first of new breed of modern researchers in the field of synesthesia that has dusted of the old ethos of perception and brought synesthesia into the 21^st century by examining not only objective science alone but also viewing subjective perception as equally important, he distils this view by highlighting that abstract thinking can often leap over boundaries that logical perception often draws blank. As a leading neurologist, DR Richard Edmund Cytowic MD approach, has not only relined the definition of synesthesia but also contributed to a new approach to not only understanding the subjective experience of synesthesia but also rewriting our view of the brain in terms of the location of the synesthestic experience and the mechanics of the brain. The emotional aspects of synesthesia and consciousness are thoroughly explored by cytowic. Cytowic’s approach to perception is almost a reverse mirror to Kandinsky, he comes from a deeply objective field (being neurology) in which fact and objectively proven observations are the tools of analysis and diagnosis. Cytowic seeks to gain an understanding of synesthesia that’s free from the constraints of objectivity.

Based on my reading and first hand experience, I set about to formulate clear-cut criteria for diagnosing synesthesia. The oldest criticism I had encountered against

Synesthesia being “real,” or even a phenomenon worthy of scientific attention, was that it was subjective. That is, it had no external manifestations. It was a condition knowable only through the reports of those who claimed to experience it.( the man who tasted shapes, r cytowic p73)

Cytowic’s move away from the objective realm into the subjective is a first for neurological science and maybe an advancement in terms of mainstream education by the basic fact that there are no out wood signs, and as we all know the objective mentality of text book science hate the thought of dealing with subjective elements. These factors within Cytowic’s progressive research into synesthesia confound to himself the importance of subjective perception balanced with objective reason. Cytowic systematically investigates what the synesthestic experience entails, setting out criteria such as typical sensations, like the photisms related to stimuli and different feelings, colours and the general format of the experience. Whether it be architectural textural columns occupied with the simultaneous sensation of a flavour or the coloured photisms that may be geometric and bioorganic form that is felt from a particular sound. There was a great need for someone to lay down the clear-cut lines, of what synesthesia it and what it is not. Kandinsky did not enjoy the luxury of such knowledge of what synesthesia truly was but this is to not say Kandinsky was “pie in the sky” mentality, contrary to that impression, Kandinsky’s original career and profession being law, Kandinsky was essentially from a scientific background, so shares much in common to our modern researcher that they both seek to progress away from objective thought and further into the realm of subjectivity. The next step in this analysis is to focus on is how Cytowic’s discoveries relate to art. Cytowic’s neurologist background and pioneering research within the field of synesthesia has brought about a understanding that synesthesia can be pleasurable as an aesthetic experience, and it can give us a understanding behind the relationships between sound, vision and the unification of art, (which will explore soon) but most of all the perceptual process of the synesthestic experience is a unification of real sensory data, not a dream or illusion of divine origin, but an actual physiological, neurological, emotional and unifying experience

Chapter 5

Cytowic looks at the possibility of the translation of light to sound but like so many before fail to come up with the “holy grail” of art, because of the vital difference between light and sound, being that one is electromagnetic energy and the other being mechanical, these two separate energies have been the bane of those who have attempted to unite them. For example in 1704 sir Isaac Newton struggled to devise mathematical formulas to equate the vibrational frequency of sound waves with a corresponding wavelength of light, he failed to find his hoped for transactional algorithm, but the idea of a correspondence took root, and the first practical application of it appears to be the clavecin oculaire, an instrument that played sound and light simultaneously. It was invented in 1725 by Charles Darwin’s grandfather, Erasmus. (The man who tasted shapes, (cytowic p53)

But there are similarities between these energies, expressed as harmonics, frequency, ratio and spectrum. These are points of reference in my own research to which I will return, Cytowic’s research begins with the problem of lack of comparability among different peoples synesthetic experience, For instance, one persons experience of red may be the key of C, but another might be the key of B. The dilemmas of the discrepancy between different synesthestic experiences, challenged those who wished to unite the arts, The Russian composer, Scriabin was one of the first people to include light in a musical score. He became aware that the mixing up of human sensory inputs was not a contrivance, but his translation of synesthesia was different from Kandinsky’s

Kandinsky and Scriabin together investigated perceptual and emotional mechanisms of synesthestic experiences but each of them was looking for a different answer to his own personal experiences. While Kandinsky’s goal of his synesthestic work was to create work that touched the soul of the viewer, Scriabin associated colour with tonality rather than single notes and he noticed that his synesthesia had an emotional basis, which helped intensify his experience of music. These differences of Kandinsky and Scriabin are covered by Cytowic’s research and expressed when he talks about the emotional mysticism that both of these artists gave to their synesthesia. This clouds true synesthetic artwork, which could be defined as work that communicates and speaks a universal language, confusing it with simply making work that is about synesthesia or is inspired by there personal view of synesthesia.

Keys also have specific colours, from the scores symbolic cover, to which Scriabin attached enormous importance; one gets the feeling for his obsession to express an almost spiritual mysticism through sensory fusion. He actually invented the “mystic chord” a series of five fourth’s (C, F#, Bb, E’, A’, D’’) that is instantly familiar and that forms the harmonic basis of most of his works. (The man who tasted shapes, cytowic p 55)

In defining synesthesia Cytowic sees Kandinsky’s work as not true synesthesia, we gain a view of the subjective conclusions that cytowic draws when dealing with the dynamics of perception.

Colour constancy is the illusion in which different stimuli look the same. The problem is that daylight is never the same. Its predominant wavelength, and therefore its colour, varies as the sun travels through the sky. Scattering, reflection, and refraction by moisture and dust also change its colour from moment to moment. Despite this constant change, a piece of white paper always looks white, an apple red a banana yellow. People’s complexions and clothing also look constant. The constant appearance of objects under wide varying conditions of illumination, intensity, and wavelength distribution is a well-known psychophysical issue and a central theme in understanding how we see. (Cytowic the man who tasted shapes p61)

Cytowic’s view of Kandinsky, questions weather Kandinsky’s depiction of synesthesia was a contrivance. Because Kandinsky’s synesthesia is improvable as was his theory on colour and artistic perception, but that’s not to say he was not synesthestic but to question weather Kandinsky was being symbolic. He (Kandinsky) promoted the symbolist notion of transferring one sense into another, but I think we have to be careful not to confuse the idea of symbolism with concrete physical sensations, even though Kandinsky was synesthetic and elaborated the idea. (Cytowic the man who tasted shapes p 84) By questioning weather Kandinsky was being symbolic or just representing synesthesia, cytowic perpetually wash’s away some of the ideas Kandinsky worked on. Because of Cytowic’s neurological background and his view of synesthesia deriving from the medical diagnosis ethos, Cytowic’s interests lay mainly with actual synesthesia as a physical involuntary condition in which no matter how many times the synesthetic subject is tested on the correlations between there synesthestic reactions to stimuli, for instance 200 cycles per second at a amplitude of 100 decibels they always responded with the same reaction, say a big pink photism. This reaction though was never always the same as another synesthestic’s reaction and this is were the problem within translational aspects of synesthesia hinder the artistic synthesis of different mediums.  Cytowic is mainly interesting in the neurology of synesthesia being the physical localization within the brain, and progress that he made in terms of physical origination of synesthesia is forwarded by his unique medical method of analysis in which a balance between subjective and objective data on synesthesia is treated as the same, this emphasis on the patients own experience (synesthetic person) is systemically viewed as raw data in terms of coming from the dragon’s mouth and views the synesthestic experience as hard data.

Conclusion

Kandinsky and cytowic

To conclude on this subject Kandinsky understands synesthesia as a gift for the chosen few, and views synesthesia not as a neurological process in terms of its cerebral origin or neurological basis but a mystical origin drawn from the desire to express as an artist and the experience of viewing as a response. This somewhat romantic notion can be understood by the world in which Kandinsky and his fellow artists inhabited and the desire to develop a more non-objective method of art, (The notion of the total work of art being a very new one then) Can be viewed as a by-product of their own synesthetic experiences and a genuine attempt to push the boundaries of art and unify the arts, synesthesia could be the perceptual tool that could unfold a new media born through the union of all media, which not only bears much resemblance to the notion of 5^th dimensional hypermedia but also to m theory (the theory of everything) the science equivalent to the total work of art.

Kandinsky’s return to the subjective is a progression for painting but not for true synesthestic art           

Cytowic’s understanding is of a neurological and perceptual basis, he does not believe Kandinsky work to be synesthestic art but only a progression in terms of understanding his own synesthesia through symbolism, not that that the term symbolism is connected to the symbolist movement but that Kandinsky’s work is not synesthesia but an expression of synesthesia, a symbol of synesthesia through the use of non objective visual language. I belief Kandinsky did have synesthesia; this can be confirmed through the writings and poetry of Kandinsky, but also highlights his conceived belief that the origin of synesthesia is divine. I also personally agree with cytowic on the idea of Kandinsky’s symbolism of synesthesia because even today with digital technology, progress on the algorithm to translate sound to vision and flavour to smell is still undiscovered if not being developed at this very moment by mainstream science. The notion of a total work of art is not necessarily synesthesia itself, because synesthesia is the physical sensation of one sense accompanied by another, combing audio and visual stimuli is only making a symbol of synesthesia with painting as a medium which often remind me of the famous Marshal McMullen saying “that the content of one medium is the previous medium”

1.0 Synesthesia and the future

Much progression with technology in the past 30years has helped aid advanced research into synesthesia in the 21^st century, even though contrary to popular belief we in 2004 have not yet reached the digital age. (Wait for those silicon chips in your kids)  Computer technology and sound synthesis techniques have moved Kandinsky’s guesswork forward past the Madame Blavatsky connection to divinity synesthesia mindset to a new union ship between media that has fuelled a surge in interest with unification. Now more than ever artist and scientists are seeking to unify and create a synthesis of faculties. This desire to unite and transcend, is I think a very human quality that reflects the fact half our brain is dedicated to abstract, subjective thought, and by the conditioning and conventions of thinking we are taught to isolate logical thought and detach from abstract thinking which is inherently emotional, (modern cultures conditioning doesn’t help ether.) this over amplification of objective thought not only destabilizes our human characteristics and Emotional qualities, but also slaves us to the fixed mechanical levels of reality though solidified belief systems that are drawn from one sided mentality.

Notably, research pioneered by the current internet sex industry have been developing a technology called hepatics which is were the feeling of touch is translated to digital information and sent to another place then converted back to the sense of touch, so two people 2000 miles apart could touch and feel each other and it would feel as if she/he is there in front of you, again this is not synesthesia but poses a technology of touch and maybe 15 years time once its perfected, would prove an interesting addition to touch to smell/sound/light translation and human interface devices. I think to truly make synesthestic art, one has to find the common language by which sound works, translate that to visual information and then use the translational method of transmuting sound to vision, to form a common language. This hypothetical language, that both of these mediums speak, could be used itself rather than vision and audio and would serve as a possible higher dimension to express and convey a new medium born from the combination of the previous applications of this higher sensory communication. The implications of the possible futures available are astronomical if such a technology exists, and would most likely take the technological form of a direct neural input to the brain via some form of digital to biochemical interface. Or by using polarized frequency EM waves to form a “wireless” interface to the neurological system.

Remember every calendar year that passes military technology increases 75 years.

Another method of making synesthestic work, is based upon military research conducted by the American government on its own populace by the CIA in the late 50s called project MK ultra, which led to greater advancements with drugs and bioacoustic response frequencies developed primarily for mind control but pioneered mainly by the secret KBG Russian scientists in a field called Bioenergics. By playing 5hz (also known as the brown note) you could make someone defecate, because of the frequency resonation of the bowels, in the same way if you use high frequency waves you can induce emotions, death, orgasm or put a voice in someone’s head. Although the application of such technology remains not within the public sector apart from advertising, its military use and perfection has led to the development of microwave and UHF weapons. (The HERF weapon is a example of a microwave weaponry) Through the use of high frequency waves, combining frequencies that correspond to visual or audio points though the use of frequency devices seems the best method of creating synesthestic art.

Bibliography

Websites

http://www.artcyclopedia.com/.

http://www.artlex.com/ArtLex/Su.html good art website

Interview with synesthesia researcher Gordon Scott MA

Gordon. I’ve been interested in the colour of air or the colour of wind, since I was little and, I imagined the colour of the wind or music which was unknown, and then, when I came back from California,

Shem. What did you do in California?

Gordon I meet a friend of mine called bob Taff, who’d been connected with development of the moog synthesiser, but his dad worked for twentieth century fox, and we was taking a course called acceleration 2000, sonic workshops, just jumping forward to 1991 I was excepted to the royal college of art after id developed this theory of sound and colour on my return from California, and they thought it was an original, and they gave me studio time in which I worked with atonal music

Shem. And what was your idea or theory about sound and colour that you went to the RCA with?

Gordon. I was looking in the encyclopaedia Britannica, and I saw the colour spectrum in there had a definite series of cycles 400-700 I think it is, and then I simultaneously was looking up sound in a old remanson encyclopaedia, and I discovered the sound spectrum also had a workable ratio in it, and by putting these two together you could roughly speaking ascertain I felt the colours of the rainbow with appropriate musical tones and I used red as a g and violet on the tonic sulpha scale and with that idea, developed a premature synthesiser connection in as much if one wanted to aka captain Nemo in 20 thousand leagues under the sea and have a colour synthesiser/organ you would be able to do that by having the colours of different notes and the lengths of them specified by musical notation .