This Artist Paints The Colors She Hears In Music

[Shawnster]

Heard this on NPR just now.  This has always fascinated me.  To see sound!  Makes you wonder how this will be in the New System.  Will these people lose this?  Is it a defect?

 

 

https://www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2019/06/05/painting-colors-music-chromesthesia

 

Between 5 and 15% of people have experienced some form of synesthesia, according to the National Institutes of Health. The cross-wiring in the brain causes a second stimuli not associated with the first — some people visualize shapes when they hear sounds, for instance.

 

People with chromesthesia "see" color. Lady Gaga, Pharrell and Kanye West have all talked about having the condition. So does artist Melissa McCracken, who creates paintings based on the colors and scenes evoked by her favorite music, from Jimi Hendrix to the Spice Girls.

 

"To be honest, I grew up not even thinking about it at all," McCracken tells Here & Now's Robin Young. "It just was something that was natural, and never second-guessed it, never even considered that someone might not be experiencing it as well."

 

 

 

 

[Friends just call me Ross]

My niece has a form of synesthesia where, instead of seeing people's faces, she sees colors and every color is related to a number.

I never realized there were so many forms of synesthesia though. 

 

Quote

 

1 Grapheme-color synesthesia

2 Chromesthesia

3 Spatial sequence synesthesia

4 Number form

5 Auditory-tactile synesthesia

6 Ordinal linguistic personification

7 Misophonia

8 Mirror-touch synesthesia

9 Lexical-gustatory synesthesia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synesthesia

Quote

Some synesthetes often report that they were unaware their experiences were unusual until they realized other people did not have them, while others report feeling as if they had been keeping a secret their entire lives.[17] The automatic and ineffable nature of a synesthetic experience means that the pairing may not seem out of the ordinary. This involuntary and consistent nature helps define synesthesia as a real experience. Most synesthetes report that their experiences are pleasant or neutral, although, in rare cases, synesthetes report that their experiences can lead to a degree of sensory overload.[21]

 

Though often stereotyped in the popular media as a medical condition or neurological aberration, many synesthetes themselves do not perceive their synesthetic experiences as a handicap. To the contrary, some report it as a gift—an additional "hidden" sense—something they would not want to miss. Most synesthetes become aware of their distinctive mode of perception in their childhood. Some have learned how to apply their ability in daily life and work. Synesthetes have used their abilities in memorization of names and telephone numbers, mental arithmetic, and more complex creative activities like producing visual art, music, and theater.[17]

 

Despite the commonalities which permit definition of the broad phenomenon of synesthesia, individual experiences vary in numerous ways. This variability was first noticed early in synesthesia research.[36] Some synesthetes report that vowels are more strongly colored, while for others consonants are more strongly colored.[21] Self reports, interviews, and autobiographical notes by synesthetes demonstrate a great degree of variety in types of synesthesia, intensity of synesthetic perceptions, awareness of the perceptual discrepancies between synesthetes and non-synesthetes, and the ways synesthesia is used in work, creative processes, and daily life.[17][37]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synesthesia#Signs_and_symptoms

 

[Cushi]

2 hours ago, Friends just call me Ross said:

My niece has a form of synesthesia where, instead of seeing people's faces, she sees colors and every color is related to a number.

I never realized there were so many forms of synesthesia though. 

 

 

Yes, my brother sees colors with numbers. He’s a literal genius. I wonder if that has something to do with it.

[Dages]

I kind of have the same with food   

[Thesauron]

Same thing happens to me with sounds. Every sound has a colour. Also, every surface has a sound. There are some other things as well. Odd, and quite useless mostly.