From April to August of 2021, Parallel Worlds will feature three monthly events that include a permanent virtual tour using artworks from the MMFA's collection selected for their scientific, historical, technical and aesthetic value. A live online colloquium where a neuroscientist and a MMFA’s volunteer guide will discuss a topic related to one aspect of vision, colour and art. And an online art-science workshop linked to the colloquium.

Vanta Black - A World without Color (Disorders in the Perception of Color)

Date: Saturday, April 24th, 2021.

Time: 5:30 PM. Duration: 1h 30 m. Seats Available: 300.

Artists create impressions of depth and light from pigments on a flat surface. In this colloquium, Doctor Patrick Cavanagh will describe how they capture scenes with almost no light – nighttime scenes – and how line drawings can depict volumes and space without any sense of light. Then we will look at shadows where the absence of light helps convey the depth in a scene. Dr. Cavanagh will also train you in the forensics of art – how to detect the short cuts that artists take, like impossible shadows, that break the rules of physics in order to achieve a more effective painting. This work because our brains take shortcuts too and artists have discovered what they are, so the infractions go unnoticed. We will discuss how to use art to do “science by looking”, unlocking the basic rules of the visual brain that were discovered by artists. 

Speakers: Patrick Cavanagh (Neuroscientist) & Marie-José Daoust (Montreal Museum of Fine Arts guide).