Vision As Contemplation: Meditation, Art, and Neuroscience in Conversation

MIT Museum
Building E28 314 Main St., Cambridge
Thursday, February 16, 6 – 7:30 p.m.

The event is free, pre registration is required. Register here. 

Sara Lazar, Associate Researcher in Psychiatry, Massachusetts General Hospital and Assistant Professor in Psychology at Harvard Medical School
The Venerable Tenzin Priyadarshi, Director of the Dalai Lama Center for Ethics and Transformative Values at MIT
Seth Riskin, Artist and Manager of the MIT Museum Studio and Compton Gallery
Pawan Sinha, Professor of Vision and Computational Neuroscience in the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences at MIT

The use of the visual image (found or created) as an introspection device to control and learn about the workings of the brain and mind are well known across meditation practices. Art and neuroscience take a different approach, evidencing perception in the images they produce.
Within the frame of ‘contemplation techniques,’ what connections can we see across these practices, and how can they be probed and strengthened?

This participatory program features large-scale images developed as contemplation devices by alumni of the MIT course Vision in Art and Neuroscience. In a group discussion engaging the audience, we will explore subjective experiences stimulated by the images, discovering connections across disciplines, with each other, and between ourselves and the world we experience.