04 August 2003

Ducks, rabbits and Duchamp In 'Of Two Minds and One Nature', Rhonda Roland Shearer and Stephen Jay Gould use the Jastrow duck-rabbit figure in discussing the idea that Leonardo, Duchamp and other artists successfully bridged art and science, and therefore show us the value of breaking down/through the unhelpful (false, even? - in the view of our authors, themselves a well-known partnership of art theorist and paleo-scientist) dichotomy between the two cultures. In a key passage from one of the most influential books of our times (The Structure of Scientific Revolution), T.S. Kuhn bridged the disciplinary gap between visual representation and conceptual innovation when he used the famous gestalt illusion of the duck-rabbit [...] as a primary symbol for the meaning and nature of scientific revolution: 'It is as elementary prototypes for these transformations of the scientist's world that the familiar demonstrations of a switch in visual gestalt prove so suggestive. What were ducks in the scientist's world before the revolution are rabbits afterwards.' An interesting article, but not sure it tells us anything new, unlike much of Shearer's research into MD. Art students usually discover the duck-rabbit figure via Gombrich, who says: we can switch from one reading to another with increasing rapidity; we will also 'remember' the the rabbit when while we see the duck, but the more closely we watch ourselves, the more certainly will we discover that we cannot experience alternative readings at the same time.' [Art and Illusion, A Study in the Psychology of Pictorial Representation, 1959, 5] Yet this famous binary flip-flop between duck and rabbit always seemed insufficient: if you look at the picture long enough, the visual opposition starts to break down. The duck aspect becomes minimally contaminated by the (possibility of flipping over to the) rabbit aspect, and vice versa. This contamination is, we guess, what makes the flip-flop possible. You start with Jastrow's duck-rabbit = a rabbit OR a duck. You end up with Jastrow's duck-rabbit = a rabbit-duck OR a duck-rabbit. (Just found our embarrassingly confused explication of same, with images from 1997. Forgive our cod-Derridean enthusiasm.) Which is what we think Wittgenstein means when he writes about 'seeing-as' being a combination of seeing and thinking [Philosophical Investigations, 212e] and: I am shewn the duck-rabbit and asked what it is; I may say 'It's a duck-rabbit'. But I may also react to the question quite differently. - The answer that it is a duck-rabbit is again the report of a perception; the answer 'Now it's a rabbit' is not. Had I replied 'It's a rabbit', the ambiguity would have escaped me, and I should be reporting my perception. The change of aspect. 'But surely you would say that the picture is altogether different now!' But what is different: my impression? my point of view? - Can I say? I describe the alteration like a perception; quite as if the object had altered before my eyes. [...] The expression of a change of aspect is the expression of a new perception and at the same time of the perception's being changed. [Philosophical Investigations, tr. G.E.M.Anscombe, 1953, 194-5] More to be read: William G. Lycan: 'Gombrich, Wittgenstein and the Duck-Rabbit', Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Vol. XXX (1971), pp. 229-237; reprinted in J.V. Canfield (ed.), The Philosophy of Wittgenstein: Aesthetics, Ethics and Religion (New York: Garland Publishing, 1985) Edward Winters: Pictures and Their Surfaces: Wollheim on 'Twofoldness' Deborah Fitzgerald: The British Avant-Garde: A Philosophical Analysis J.C. Nyiri: The Picture Theory of Reason Shearer has cited the duck-rabbit figure in discussing Duchamp before: Examining Evidence and Boats and Deckchairs. 1:26:19 PM     comments