A Journey Through Twisted Perception
“To be an artist, you must have great eyesight.” Seems obvious, doesn’t it?
It’s wrong. It’s wrong on many levels. Great eyesight is a measurement toward a norm, and not much of a norm at that. A bare majority of adults have “great” (let’s say 20/20) eyesight. A few have “better” than 20/20. The rest – slightly less than 50% – have some form of “defective” vision. I’m one of them. I’m functionally blind in my right eye. And here’s then thing: it’s been, on balance, an aid to my artwork. I see, and perceive, the world “differently”. That’s what artists are supposed to do, isn’t it? Just go look at the works of later Monet, or Van Gogh, or Mary Cassatt…
Click on the Turner painting here to take you to the short pdf essay:
This painting is “Snow Storm – Steamboat off a Harbour’s Mouth”, painted by JMW Turner in 1842.
The condition which led to my partial eyesight is called Keratoconus. For more information about it, follow the link HERE to take you to the RNIB page on it.
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