Brain Scans And The Scanner

I've been looking at brain scans of OCD suffers against those who don't suffer from the illness and have been surprised to see some visual differences as well as reading up on the mental ones.

I'm interested in capturing brain activity because it's something that we can't see whenever we chose. We can't see what our brains look like when they're processing thoughts, when they're telling us we're sad, when they're sending hyperactive signals to our limbs or when we're dreaming...

Once again I found myself researching the potential brain malfunctions of an OCD sufferer even though I've already done this twice before I still feel as though readin up more on it will give me a clearer idea of how OCD potentially exists. 

The Orbital Cortex os the area of the brain that is located behind the eyebrows. It is involved in initial perseption of fear and danger. It detects whether something is right or wrong. 

The Anterior Cingulate Gyrus is activated by the detection of fear and causes for example stomach churning and anxiety to respond with fear sensations. 

The Caudate Nucleus is the filtering station for the thoughts which come from the Orbital Cortex. It is involved with automatic transmission which means it is part of the brain which switched from one thought or behaviour to another. It is basically the on/off switch. 

Now I know a little bit more about what certain parts of the brain do I can confidently move on to producing some pieces of work based around the idea of brain activity, brain scans and OCD.

I googled brain scans purely for the visuals, I don't know what these brain scans say about the person who's brain they are from, I just appreciate the colours and detail in these images. I'm intrigued by the extremely bright brain wire images which I've previously mention after visiting the Wellcome Image Award Exhibition in Manchester. The bright wires are such a beautiful way to represent something going on inside our heads, it's almost unbelievable that we have wiring, tubes and all sorts inside us and it's images like that that make you realise how complicated a working human being is. 

I scanned my face onto the scanner and overlapped it with one of the wired brain images I found on the internet then I darkened the edges to give it a more even tone. It's a simple strategy and idea that I think has an interesting quality upon it's result. 

The brain scan fit perfectly over the face of my model on this scanner image. I don't like the smooth curve of the head, it's too prominent  I prefer a more blended mix between images after overlapping and changing the opacity.

The squashed face on the model in my scanner photo reminds me of Jenny Saville's work.

The squashes face, glass marks being pressed onto the skin and the distorted expression create a distressed look in the model. 

When looking at brain scans online I came across a lot of pictures of labelled brains, I liked the look of them because they looked professional, clinical and serious. 

I have an idea to label a brain with the thoughts and actions of what that part of the brain does in an OCD sufferers for example the Thalamus becomes hyperactive in OCD sufferers so I could label it with hyperactive thoughts and activity represented by crazy colours and chaotic patterns. 

Out Of The Blue Inspiration

I went to my family home for the weekend and when I walked into the living room to say hi to my family and drop my heavy bags off my brother was watching the music channel, some songs that I'd never seen the video to were playing and the graphics and lyrics caught my attention. The songs were Jeremy by Pearl Jam and Move, Shake, Hide by Marmozets.

I began by watching Jeremy on Youtube and made quick notes and took screen shots throughout followed by a summed up paragraph of what I thought the song/video was about due to what I'd seen and heard.

Quick notes and screen shots:

-Young boy painting, paintings looked rushed and childlike. Reminds me of OCD painting therapy.

- Boy interacts with painting of a wolf and images of what seem to be people-less clothes hanging in the trees.

-Boy seems to be getting bullied by everyone in school, they're all pointing and laughing at him. He looks the same as them but still different. He wears the same clothes as the rest of the school kids but they still point and laugh at him.

-Boy seems to be shouting at what looks like his parents or someone with authority. It's strange. It's as though he's angry at them for some reason. The mother figure looks to be telling the father off just like the boy does. The father's hand gesture implies that he's saying ''It's not my fault", "I don't know" or "It's not my responsibility". 

-In the background on chalkboard it says "Anxiety Disorders", "Environmental Stress" and "Hereditary Factors".

Whilst watching this music video I was following a story in my mind from what I thought the video was about. I saw a young boy named Jeremy who was angry, trapped and different to everyone else. He ran away and released his frustration by drawing and painting. He interacted with images of a wolf with it's mouth open like it was roaring with rage, this wolf symbolized the boy and his feelings, he was a raging wolf inside. The clip shown above of the classroom, the teacher and the chalkboard caught my attention, it was only on screen for about 5 seconds but I was scanning the whole image on each clip for clues as to what the video was about. What I got from this clip was that the words "Anxiety Disorders", "Environmental Stress" and "Hereditary Factors"on the chalkboard were something to keep in mind because they're so clearly presented, it was obvious the viewer was supposed to pick up on these. One of the clips showed the class pointing and laughing at Jeremy, to me this suggested he was being bullied for something, all of the attention seemed to be on him for some reason. At the end of the video Jeremy walks into the classroom with confidence, he's wearing no shirt, when previously he was shown wearing the same as the other students, this suggested to me that he had 'escaped' them, he was no longer one of them, he had got out of what he once was involved in. The end proved to be shocking when it seemed as though Jeremy killed himself in front of the whole class, it was at this point when I thought the words "Anxiety Disorders", "Environmental Stress" and "Hereditary Factors" that were earlier shown on the chalkboard were describing the reasons of why he would end up killing himself. 

I then researched the real meaning to the video to see if it had any similarities to what I thought had been portrayed when I watched it. I found an article written by Jessica Letkemann on January 7th 2011 called 'Jeremy Spoke In Class Today' from the website http://www.twofeetthick.com/2011/01/jeremy-spoke-in-class-today/

Different parts of this video influenced me in different ways. At the start of the video when the young boy is painting in the woods his quick, angry, child like style of painting reminded me of a video I'd previously watched on youtube about OCD art therapy, I've since looked for this video but can't locate it. The video was about a young woman who suffered from OCD and one day a lady visited her, I'm assuming this lady was a support worker or nurse because she introduced the OCD sufferer to OCD art therapy, she asked the OCD lady to make her hand messy and paint, the OCD sufferer was reluctant at first but once she faced her fears and produced a big brown, unrecognisable blog on some A3 paper she felt better about getting dirty. The thing that interested me about her painting was the stages it followed, she added more colours, shapes and patterns each time and each time it got dirtier looking. Some stages of the painting I found myself recognising objects and making stories up in my head but it ended in a plain, dull, one toned mess. I will experiment with paints in conjunction to OCD and germs.

Another part of the video that caught my attention was the evil glare that the singer had on his face every time he showed up on screen, it gave me the idea to ask OCD sufferers what OCD would look like if it was a person because even though I don't suffer from it myself and I can only imagine, I would say OCD was an evil, demonic looking person. I'm interested to see what OCD sufferers say.

Move Shake Hide is a song by UK based band Marmozets. The video is chaotic, crazy, rave like, and loud. What interested me about this music video was that throughout it the band are jumping around, crazily dancing all around an empty room and it got me thinking that in terms of my project the people could symbolise OCD and how it constantly bounces around a sufferers mind which in this case happens to be represented by an empty, dark painted room. I'm not suggesting this was the intention of the video, I'm saying that that was the idea that I got after watching it. Another element that I could link to was the use of UV paint.

UV paint flashes upon the faces of certain band members in a rave like fashion, it reminded me of the earlier work I did with UV paint and has inspired me to pick it up again and experiment with UV paint and lighting with people as opposed to just objects.

Idea - Post It Notes Developed

I was looking online for stats about microbes around the home and I came across this website: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/top-spots-for-household-bacteria/ which listed the stats on how many bacteria per inch are in certain areas around the home. I found the list very shocking and once again I was put off my food whilst reading it, I didn't want to eat the sandwich I had in my hand after knowing I'd touched thousands of bacteria already within just an couple of hours by touching things that I wouldn't normally think would pose as risk to me. I want others to know of this risk and I want to see their reactions to hearing how much bacteria there is around the home. I'm going to write the stats down on post it notes and stick them in the area that the note is describing the bacteria count for, this experiment is similar to my original idea following this path but this time I'm going to do it in my student home, I'm not going to tell my housemates about the experiment before hand and later on I will ask them what they thought of the things they read. I feel as though this will be am much more intimate experiment as I'll be able to talk to the person coming across the notes face to face rather than witnessing it from afar like I did with the post it notes in public experiment.

The stats that I'll be placing around the home are from this list:

Toilet bowl: 3.2 million bacteria/square inch
Kitchen drain: 567,845 bacteria/square inch
Sponge or counter-wiping cloth: 134,630 bacteria/square inch
Bathtub, near drain: 119,468 bacteria/square inch
Kitchen sink, near drain: 17,964 bacteria/square inch
Kitchen faucet handle: 13,227 bacteria/square inch
Bathroom faucet handle: 6,267 bacteria/square inch
Bathroom sink, near drain: 2,733 bacteria/square inch
Pet food dish, inside rim: 2,110 bacteria/square inch
Kitchen floor, in front of sink: 830 bacteria/square inch
Toilet floor, in front of toilet: 764 bacteria/square inch
Kitchen countertop: 488 bacteria/square inch
Bathroom countertop: 452 bacteria/square inch
Garbage bin: 411 bacteria/square inch
Dish towel: 408 bacteria/square inch
Toy: 345 bacteria/square inch
Kitchen tabletop: 344 bacteria/square inch
Home office phone or refrigerator door: 319 bacteria/square inch
Toilet seat: 295 bacteria/square inch
Bathroom light switch: 217 bacteria/square inch
Microwave buttons: 214 bacteria/square inch
Kitchen chopping board: 194 bacteria/square inch
Child-training potty: 191 bacteria/square inch
Infant changing mat and infant high chair: 190 bacteria/square 
Kitchen phone: 133 bacteria/square inch
Bathroom door's inside handle: 121 bacteria/square inch
Toilet's flush handle: 83 bacteria/square inch
TV remote control: 70 bacteria/square inch
Home office computer keyboard: 64 bacteria/square inch
Home office computer mouse: 50 bacteria/square inch

I will stick them around my student home when I get back later tonight so when me housemates wake up in the morning they will be completing their daily routine along with the shocking statistics of how much bacteria they're sharing their routine with. Hopefully what I've wrote on the post it notes is self explanatory after I've located them in their specific spaces, if my feedback comes back that it wasn't then I'll modify what I write on them and complete the experiment in another location. I would also like to do this experiment in my family home as well to compare the results of how the students found it to how my family found it due to the stereotypical view upon students of being un-tidy, un-clean and not caring as much about sanitation to what families may do. 

Idea - Posters

When planing my post it note idea I thought of something else similar to that that might grab the attention of passers by in public areas ore than a few scattered post it notes. I thought I could make A4 posters that were bright, bold, and in specific block colours that stated a statistic or fact about the public area that I would then later on stick the poster up in. I will experiment with this idea later on unless my post it note idea is extremely successful.

Exhibition Idea

I don't yet know exactly what I want to display as a final outcome in the End of Year Exhibition but I have got a few ideas flowing around my mind. I like the idea of displaying whatever it is I want to display for example a series of images, I could display them all over the exhibition rather than al in one place to simulate how germs spread and can be found almost anywhere. I've displayed work like this in another exhibition I did and it went down very well, everyone loved the surprise of finding my work in a place that they wouldn't expect, it certainly grabbed people attention more than work I've done where I've displayed it all together in one spot.

Website of Interest

I typed in OCD art into youtube and it came up with something that I thought might have been relevant,  it was a edgy video of a guy doing some stencil art whilst a voice in the background states information about OCD. I didn't understand what the video was about until the end when I was directed to a website. I checked the website out and it isn't really relevant to this current project it was an interesting site that I might want to look back on at a later date to gain information or influence for a different project. http://www.redefinegallery.com The website is for a gallery in Orlando that specialises in art and photography. The work seems to be street and urban based, it's very modern, youthful and trendily up to date. There is an exhibition about a guy called SKIP that suffers from OCD (which is who was in the stencil art video which lead me to this site) but the exhibition isn't any help or relation to what I'm doing.

Microbe Spreading Experiment - Results

I went back to the photos that I left in my family home stuck in places where microbes gather, I left it just over a week to pick them up.

After retrieving the images from their areas I scanned them into the computer to highlight the collected dirt and compared them to the before and after shots. 

Before:

After:

After just over a week a few toothpaste marks had gathered onto the image but nothing too drastic occurred. I was shocked at how little was caught on the image, I expected hair, more toothpaste, and moisturiser and other creams to have spilt onto the photo. 

Before:

After:

The light switch image had a rough texture to it after the week was up but no visuals were picked up on the scanner. I think the fact that the image was stuck over the original light switch meant it was harder to press the switches so more use and harder pushing was needed which is probably why the image itself suffered as much as it did, it was as though the middle of the image was beginning to wear away. I would like to have picked up some visual damage.

Before:

After:

The floor near the cat bowl was affected quite a bit due to the messiness of my cat's eating habits. The floor didn't display the green colour that we can see so that must have come from the scanner.

Before:

After:

This is the image from the side of my kitchen sink. I'm not sure how the bright orange lines occurred but I'm assuming it was from a mixture of water and washing up liquid. This image reminds me of a photo that has been damaged with bleach, something that I've experimented with earlier on in this project. I like the oil spill look that this photo has, it makes it look industrial and dirty. The orange lines and coloured patches resemble the look of specific microbes under the microscope which is something I've looked into a lot throughout this whole project. I like this photo because of the rapid different between the before and after image as well as the effect of the aftermath itself. I'd like to experiment with water and washing up liquid to see what happens in a more controlled environment. The contrast between microbes and cleanliness is shown in this image because it was placed in that space to capture germs yet it seems to have come away after capturing being cleaned, watered and soaped on.