Kunstgalleri
Erwin-Josef Speckmann: ‚Convulsion #1 and #2’ (2007)
The "normal" undisturbed function of the brain is associated with a rapid interplay of excitation and inhibition of the nerve cells. This seeming chaos of constant changes in activity is subject to differentiated control systems of the nervous system.
During an epileptic event, this natural interplay is disturbed in a diffuse (both cerebral hemispheres affected) or focal (regionally circumscribed) manner – in such a way as to result in a consonance (synchrony) of the excitation processes; a large proportion of the nerve cells is stimulate simultaneously. This results in a sort of bundling, a simultaneous, collective, ‘electrochemical alignment’ of the nerve cells, an "ordering". Moreover, since this ‘simultaneously switched on’ excitation is stronger than usual (‘Hyper-synchrony’), the overall process doubly abnormal and dangerous for the brain; the brain is unable to cope with this overload and reacts with an epileptic fit, that, in physicochemical terms, is equivalent to a colossal, bundled discharge (similar to the electric discharges [lightning bolts!] in a storm in the natural world).
The artistic work of E.-J. Speckmann (a contemporary, renowned researcher in the field of epilepsy!) presented here considers these processes within the brain, with the following interpretation seeming to be possible:
On one side of each of the two panels (oil on paperboard) several constructions (4 on one panel and 10 on the other) of diverse forms and sizes are presented, with a changing relationship to each other. On the other side of each, however, a very schematic order is presented, a strong alignment of identical forms (squares).
Applied to the theme of "Brain – Epilepsy", this could have the following meaning (where each panel could represent one of the cerebral hemispheres): One site of each panel presents the (normal) interplay of the nerve cells, while other shows a common alignment for the ‘simultaneous switching on’ of the cells for their "dangerous ordering" – the basis for an epileptic event!
