Carnie: "hands on" and "outsiders" response

From: Andrew Carnie
Date: Wed, 14 Mar 2007 07:19:31 -0400 (EDT)

I do wonder whether our training sets our brains differently. I wonder whether the situation is analogous to sport. In sport, preparation sets up the body for the rigours of the particular activity. It is impossible to think a thin framed, lean cyclist like Lance Armstrong could be involved in the Tour de France and in-between be an American Football player in the Super Bowl. The world I think my work comes from as an artist is the area of slippage and leakage between brain areas the fortuitous accident and the ability to recognise its value. Living at ease with this state and maintaining it is difficult. In science a different rigour is needed. It is strange how many artists are dyslexics and I wonder if this is part of the brain set needed to be artistic. I did start a training to be a scientist and think I could have done this; but I think much of either of these disciplines is dammed hard work and doing the amount of labour twice over to be fully trained in two disciplines is hard to conceive of unless the economics of matters changed massively to help free up lots of time. My dyslexia would certainly have got in the way and I could never do the paired down writing that Richard achieves for his journal submissions; that I am jealous of.