Synesthesia

Luke, D., Terhune, D & Friday, R. (2012). Psychedelic synaesthesia: Evidence for a serotonergic role in synaesthesia. Seeing and Perceiving, 25, 74.

The neurobiology of synaesthesia is receiving growing attention in the search for insights into consciousness, such as the binding problem. One way of decoding the neurocognitive mechanisms underlying this phenomenon is to investigate the induction of synaesthesia via neurochemical agents, as commonly occurs with psychedelic substances. How synaesthesia is affected by drugs can also help inform us of the neural mechanisms underlying this condition. To address these questions we surveyed a sample of recreational drug users regarding the prevalence, type and frequency of synaesthesia under the influence of psychedelics and other psychoactive substances. The results indicate that synaesthesia is frequently experienced following the consumption of serotonergic agonists such as LSD and psilocybin and that these same drugs appear to augment synaesthesia in congenital synaesthetes. These results implicate the serotonergic system in the experience of synaesthesia.

MuVi5 is the fifth edition of Visual Music dedicated videos – following upon MuVi (Granada, 2007), MuVi2
(Granada, 2009), MuVi3 (Almeria, 2012) and MuVi4 (Alcalá la Real, Jaén, 2015) – an event that
completes the Fifth International Conference Sinestesia: Ciencia y Arte, which took place at Alcalá la Real,
Jaén (Convento Capuchinos) and the “Victoria Eugenia” Conservatory of Music of Granada, in Spain, from
May 18th to 21th.This is a collection of kinetic works in visual, audiovisual, or interactive fields, from artists,
musicians, designers, and performers, designed on music. Alongside the videos from professionals are also
works produced in the academic field, presented by professors, or directly by university students, academies
of fine arts, and music conservatories. The catalog contains an extensive selection of photographs and videos
submitted by participants whose home countries are European, including England (London), Hungary (Pécs),
Ireland (Dublin), Italy (Milan), Poland (Warsaw), and Spain (Granada, Girona), as well as outside of Europe,
including China (Hong Kong), New Zealand (Auckland), and the USA (Alabama, Massachusetts, Oregon).
Links included about 100 minutes of online video.

The traditional model of our mental function is that first our senses provide data to our brain, which then translates those senses into the appropriate mental phenomena: light into visual images, air vibrations into auditory experiences, etc. But what if that process is actually occurring simultaneously? Danko Nikolić describes the theory of ideasthesia.

Since mirror neurons were introduced to the neuroscientific community more than 20 years ago, they have become
an elegant and intuitive account for different cognitive mechanisms (e.g., empathy, goal understanding) and conditions
(e.g., autism spectrum disorders). Recently, mirror neurons were suggested to be the mechanism underlying a specific
type of synesthesia. Mirror-touch synesthesia is a phenomenon in which individuals experience somatosensory
sensations when seeing someone else being touched. Appealing as it is, careful delineation is required when applying
this mechanism. Using the mirror-touch synesthesia case, we put forward theoretical and methodological issues that
should be addressed before relying on the mirror-neurons account.

RESEARCH
Svetlana Konanchuk (Saint Petersburg).
Synesthesia as an Interspecific Artistic Universal and Aesthetic Category.
Keywords: aesthetics, aesthetic consciousness, aesthetic experience, neuroesthetics, musical synesthetics, synesthesia, synthesis of arts.

Anton Sidoroff-Dorso (Moscow).
Anthropology of Synaesthesia. A Neurophenomenological Paradigm as a Natural Science Framework for Researching Cross-Modal Cognitive Processes.
Keywords: cognitive synaesthesia, cross-modal metaphor, neurophenomenology, neuroanthropology, normative emergence, perceptual symbol system, anthropology of synaesthesia.

Denis Mylnikov (Saint Petersburg).
Color as an Expressive Element in S. M. Eisenstein’ Concept of «Synaesthetics» (on the Example of the «Feast in Alexandrovskaya Sloboda» from the Film «Ivan the Terribl»).
Keywords: motion picture, conventionality, color, emotions, «Ivan the Terrible», S. M. Eisenstein.

Larisa Berezovchuk (Saint Petersburg).
The Functions of a Color and Music in Film Narration: the “Discourse’ Plan” (on an Example on a Krzysztof Kieslowski’ Trilogy “Three Colors”).
Keywords: film narration, color, movie image, “the story plan”, “the discourse plan”, Krzysztof Kieslowski’ trilogy “Three Colors”.

Viktoriia Antipova (Saratov).
Indonesian Theater of Flat Images: a Symbolic of Shadow and Light.
Keywords: Indonesia, wayang kulit, dalang, gamelan.

Mikhail Zalivadny (Saint Petersburg).
Musical Sets of Variative Structure: from Louis-Bertrand Castel to Bulat Galeyev.
Keywords: general theory of systems, theory of the variable system, music and mathematics, history of music theory, synaesthesia, interrelation of the arts, Louis-Bertrand Castel, Bulat Galeyev.

Irina Viskova (Moscow).
The World of Musical Metaphors in the Creations of Polish Painter Jacek Malczewski.
Keywords: Jacek Malczewski, metaphor in music, Polish painting at the turn of the XIX–XX centuries, Symbolism, Vielle, Lute, Torban, Hurdy-gurdy.

Elena Shakhmatova (Moscow).
M. Matyushin’s Color Philosophy in the Aspect of the Cosmic Worldview.
Keywords: “Victory over the sun”, “extended watching”, avant-garde, futurism, color theory.

Kirill Smolkin (Moscow).
«Music Follows the Light». To the M. K. Čiurlionis’ Idea on the Opera «Jūratė».
Keywords: Mikalojus Čiurlionis, opera «Jūratė», synthesis of arts, music and painting, light-music.

Olga Kolganova (Saint Petersburg).
The Model of the Light-Monument for the October Revolution: The History of Creation and Reconstruction (1927 — 1987 — 2017).
Keywords: Light Monument of the October Revolution, Grigory Gidoni, Naum Mogilevsky, light-architecture, light-sculpture, light-orchestra, light-theater, Art of Light and Color.

PRACTICE
Irina Evteeva (Saint Petersburg).
The interaction of light, pictorial art and sound in the imaginative solution of the motion picture (examples from personal practice).
Keywords: animation, glass painting, directing, author’s layer, light-pictorial scumbling glaze, plastic dramaturgy, internal conflict, texture of the image, dramaturgy of sound.

Vladimir Persov (Saint Petersburg).
Cinematography — the Art for is not a Sound-made, but Sonorical: Specificity for the Sonour Space Formation in I. Evteeva’ Animated-game Motion Pictures.
Keywords: sound fabric, intonation, phonogram, visual space, acoustic space, counterpoint, speech, author's music, animation, sound-visual image.

Olesya Rostovskaya (Moscow — Saint Petersburg).
The ANS Synthesizer: Potential Uses and Development Illustrated by Various Compositions Between 2009 and 2018.
Keywords: ANS synthesizer, electro-acoustic, E. Murzin, new music for ANS, O. Rostovskaya.

Anastasia Maximova (Kazan, Republic of Tatarstan).
From the History of Light-Music Performances in Kazan (1962–2019).
Keywords: group “Prometheus”, Bulat Galeev, synaesthesia, light-music, light-music devices, light-music performances.

Valeriya Nedlina (Almaty, Kazakhstan), Yekaterina Demiterko (Yekaterinburg, Russia).
Sound, Color and Action of a Composition Concept of R. Begenov’s Play “Medea. Material”.
Keywords: spectacle “Medea. Material”, pop-mechanical ballet, Rustem Begenov, biculturalism, intertextual analysis.

LABORATORY.
Dilyara Galiakberova (Republic of Tatarstan).
Infographics as an Object for a Demonstrating Kazan Kremlin Territory Soundscape.
Keywords: sound landscape, sound walk, acoustic ecology, synaesthesia, infographics, architectural environment, museum-reserve “Kazan Kremlin”.

Yaroslav Bezokov (Novosibirsk).
Synthesizer as Light Controller in Interactive Light-Music.
Keywords: interactive light-music, create and programming keyboard light-musical instruments.

Aqnar Sharipbaeva (Atyrau, Republic of Kazakhstan).
The Unique Musical Timbre of the Kazakh Kylkobyz and the Association of Light and Color.
Keywords: ethnomusicology, Kazakh musical instrument, folk instruments, kobyz, kobyz art.

Sergey Zorin (Moscow).
Musical Light Painting and the Optical Theater as an Attempt to Mitigate XXIst Century Audiovisual Pressure.
Keywords: Optical theater, musical light painting, S. Zorin.

Alexey Goltykhov (Moscow).
Light Music — a New Kind of Art for Collective Perception (on the Example of the Moscow “Theater of Light”).
Keywords: Moscow “Theater of Light”, light-music, definition, synthesis of arts, historical phenomenon, technology.

RESEARCH ARTICLES
J. Angelo Corlett, Are Women Beach Volleyballers ‘Too Sexy for Their Shorts?’
Arnold Cusmariu, The Prometheus Challenge
Paul Gomberg, Workers without Rights
Erick Jose Ramirez, A Conditional Defense of Shame and Shame Punishment
Bianca-Alexandra Savu, Grounds and Structural Realism: A Possible Metaphysical Framework
Mark David Webster, Questioning Technological Determinism through Empirical Research
DISCUSSION NOTES/DEBATE
Fred Adams and Charlotte Shreve, Reply to Gennaro