How to Use Your Eyes

273 Pages·2000·23.89 MB·English

by  James Elkins

H O W T O U S E Y O U R E Y E S
H O W T O U S E
Y O U R E Y E S
J A M E S E L K I N S
R O U T L E D G E
NEW YORK • LONDON
First published in 2000 by Routledge
This edition first published in paperback in 2009
by Routledge
270 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016
Simultaneously published in the UK
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2008.
“To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s
collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.”
© 2000 by James Elkins
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any
form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented,
including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system,
without permission in writing from the publishers.
Trademark Notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trade-
marks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Elkins, James, 1955—
How to Use Your Eyes/James Elkins.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-415-92254-2
1. Vision. 2. Attention. 3. Visual discrimination I. Title.
QP475.5.E456 2000
612.8’4—dc21
00-036598
ISBN 0-203-94341-4(cid:13)(cid:10) Master e-book ISBN
ISBN-13: 978-0-415-99363-0 (pbk.)
ISBN-13: 978-0-203-94341-0 (e-bk.)
ISBN-10: 0-415-99363-6 (pbk.)
ISBN-10: 0-203-94341-4 (e-bk.)
MORE PRAISE FOR HOW TO USE YOUR EYES:
“You know how you’re always being challenged to specify what you’d want to take
along for a stint of solitary confinement on some remote desert isle? With this daz-
zling volume, James Elkins effectively proposes that all you’d ever really need to bring
would be your own eyes—your eyes, that is, properly tuned and vitalized. If the doors
of perception were cleansed, Blake used to insist, we’d see the world as it truly is,
which is to say, infinite. Leaving aside its vitalizing bounty of particular revelations,
what Elkins is really offering with this marvelous book is nothing less than Murine
for the mind, Windex for the soul.”
—Lawrence Weschler, author of Mr. Wilson’s Cabinet of Wonder: Pronged Ants,
Horned Humans, Mice on Toast and Other Marvels of Jurassic Technology
“A magical mystery tour of the ordinary and arcane. Elkins goes detecting, explaining,
experimenting so that, our vision revitalized, we can finally see.”
—Rosamond W. Purcell, photographer of Swift as a Shadow: Extinct and Endangered
Animals.
“Intriguing, informative, and revealing. A beautiful guide to the art of not just look-
ing but also seeing.”
—Antonio R. Damasio, neuroscientist and author of The Feeling of What Happens
“In 32 informed yet graceful essays, Mr. Elkins, a professor at the School of the Art
Institute of Chicago, teaches you how to look at postage stamps, pavement, Egyptian
hieroglyphs, the periodic table, grass, a twig, moths’ wings, color, the inside of your
eye and nothing at all, among other man-made and natural things.”
—The New York Times
“… Elkins proves himself an enthusiastic, fun guide. With dozens of full-color pho-
tographs, this is a great book for the coffee table.”
—Publishers Weekly
“… a useful book for writers, artists and teachers, as well as the rest of us to enrich
our daily lives.”
—Marilee Reyes, Star-News
“Elkins shows us the extraordinary in the most ordinary of things.”
—Jerry Davich, Northwest Indiana Times
“An intriguing and beautiful project, it is wide-ranging and well-informed in the sub-
jects it covers… this book…takes us on a fascinating exploration of the visual world—
which we too easily forget extends beyond television, movies, and art museums—in all
its rich diversity.”
—Lisa Soccio, afterimage

Published Pinr 2e0f0a0c bey ix
Routledge
29 West 35th Street T H I N G S M A D E B Y M A N
London EC4P 4EE
A Postage Stamp 2
1 how to look at
Copyright © 2000 by James Elkins
Printed in the United States of American on acid free paper.
ACulvert 12
2 how to lookat
All right reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or by
any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopy-
An Oil Painting 20
3 how to lookat
ing and recording or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing
from the publishers.
Pavement 28
4 how to lookat
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Elkins, James, 1955- An X ray 34
5 how to lookat
How to use your eyes/James Elkins.
p. cm. Linear B 48
6 how to lookat
Includes bibliographical references and index.
7 ISBN 0h-o4w15 -t9o2 l2o5o4k-2at Chinese and Japanese Script 54
1. Vision. 2. Attention. 3. Visual discrimination. I. Title.
Egyptian Hieroglyphs 62
8QP475.5 .hEo4w56 t 2o0 l0o0okat
(cid:2)
612.8 4—dc21
Egyptian Scarabs 68
9 how to lookat
An Engineering Drawing 74
10 how to lookat
A Rebus 80
11 how to lookat
Mandalas 86
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Perspective Pictures 92
13 how to lookat
An Alchemical Emblem 100
14 how to lookat
Special Effects 108
15 how to lookat
The Periodic Table 118
16 how to lookat
A Map 126
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T H I N G S M A D E B Y N A T U R E
AShoulder 132
18 how to look at
AFace 146
19 how to lookat
A Fingerprint 154
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Grass 164
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ATwig 170
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Sand 176
23 how to lookat
Moths’ Wings 182
24 how to lookat
Halos 190
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Sunsets 196
26 how to lookat
Color 202
27 how to lookat
The Night 212
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Mirages 218
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A Crystal 224
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VIII

S The Inside of Your Eye 232
31 how to lookat
E
Y
E

R Nothing 238
U 32 how to lookat
O
Y

E Postscript: How Do We Look to a Scallop? 243
S
U

O
T For Further Reading 247

W
O
H
Figure Credits 255
P R E F A C E
Our eyes are far too good for us. They show us so much that we can’t take it all
in, so we shut out most of the world, and try to look at things as briskly and
efficiently as possible.
What happens if we stop and take the time to look more carefully? Then the
world unfolds like a flower, full of colors and shapes that we had never suspected.
Some things can’t really be seen without reams of special information. I cannot
hope to understand the monitors I see in pictures of NASA’s command center, or
the strange implements in my doctor’s office. I don’t pretend to be able to guess the
insides of my digital watch and I can’t decipher the scary-looking devices in the
electric relay station that is a few blocks from where I live. There are books that can
help you learn to understand such things, but this is not one of them. This book
won’t tell you how to repair your refrigerator or read bar codes. It’s not a museum
guide, either—you won’t learn how to understand fine art. And you won’t learn
how to predict the weather by looking at clouds, or how to wire a house, or how to
track animals in the snow.
In short, this is not a reference tool. It’s a book about learning to see anything,
learning to use your eyes more concertedly and with more patience than you might
ordinarily do. It’s about stopping and taking the time simply to look, and keep
looking, until the details of the world slowly reveal themselves. I especially love the
strange feeling I get when I am looking at something and suddenly I understand—
the object has structure; it speaks to me. What was once a shimmer on the horizon
becomes a specific kind of mirage, and it tells me about the shape of the air I am
walking through. What was once a meaningless pattern on a butterfly’s wing be-
comes a code, and it tells me how that butterfly looks to other butterflies. Even a