Eric R. Kandel

Whereas the face is critical to the expression of the emotion, the hands and body signal how a person is coping with emotion. [302]

Even a brief scan of the hardbound edition makes evident the ambitious scope Kandel brings to this project: the illustrations are a heady mix of art reproductions, diagrams & schematics, photo portraits, and clinical images (including neural scans); the Table of Contents, running to three pages, reveals a wide net bringing in artists & movements, cultural trends, psychological research and theorists, and specific topics in neurobiology; and the book closes with near-scholarly Endnotes and Index. Even so, I wasn't anticipating either the depth or breadth of the argument on offer. This is not only an essay on the expression of emotion in art; it is also how our brains process images, and from these images produce emotion, and thereby build a "survival mechanism" which proved key to human civilisation.

Kandel structures his argument methodically and deploys brief, clearly written chapters. Much ground is covered, both artistic influences and schools, scientific literature and experiments, but his discussion is unfailingly lucid. That level of detail, however, tends to leave the reader lost in the wood. Kandel's division of the book into five parts goes a long way to keeping the attentive reader on track; indeed, just reading the section heads orients the reader and hints at the interplay between Kandel's topics of interest. It also supports dipping into specific sections without having full recollection of all preceding chapters: while I intend to re-read the full text eventually, it's useful knowing I can also revisit specific sections and still find it instructive.

Part 1 - A PSYCHOANALYTIC PSYCHOLOGY AND ART OF UNCONSCIOUS EMOTION
Mind and visual arts

Part 2 - A COGNITIVE PSYCHOLOGY OF VISUAL PERCEPTION AND EMOTIONAL RESPONSE TO ART
Mind and visual process

Part 3 - BIOLOGY OF THE BEHOLDER'S VISUAL RESPONSE TO ART
Brain and visual arts

Part 4 - BIOLOGY OF THE BEHOLDER'S EMOTIONAL RESPONSE TO ART
Brain and visual process

Part 5 - AN EVOLVING DIALOGUE BETWEEN VISUAL ART AND SCIENCE
Brain and mind and vision, as a means of better understanding human experience

We know now that one of the reasons expressonist art appeals to us so strongly is that we have evolved a remarkably large, social brain. It contains extended representations of faces, hands, bodies, and bodily movement, and as a result we are hardwired to respond unconsciously as well as consciously to exaggerated depictions of these parts of the body and their movement. Moreover, the brain's mirror neuron system, theory-of-mind system, and biological modulators of emotion and empathy endow us with a great capacity for understanding other people's minds and emotions. [500]

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Key to Kandel's achievement are the concise yet detailed chapters on specific aspects of his argument, substituting multiple linked & focused essays for what might elsewise be a meandering and lengthy treatise.

Artists: Gustav Klimt - Oskar Kokoschka - Egon Schiele - Arthur Schnitzler - Franz Xaver Messerschmidt
Psychologists: Sigmund Freud
Medical / Neurobiologists: Carl von Rokitansky - Josef Skoda
Social Scientists / Humanists: Ernst Gombrich… (mere)