Hill Rag Magazine – June 2022

Page 106

. arts and dining .

ARTandtheCITY by Jim Magner

ARTIST PORTRAIT: DANA SIMMONS

Dana Simmons, Ph.D.

their natural beauty and their inherent power to control our physical movement and maybe a Brain trees? Or are they dancing celot more. She digitally reproduclebrities in a Mardi Gras parade? Rufes and infuses the images into our fled rumba revelers, brightly colored minds by colorizing and arranging and ready to party. Or maybe blood vesthem in ever more imaginable configsel networks? Coral structures? Leaf veins? urations. She can provoke emotions with Yes. They can be anything your mind wants them color variations and even shift our thought to be, because that is what they are – cells from a patterns and opinions with subtle insinuahuman brain. Your brain is watching itself – looktions and inferences. ing at its mirror image…almost. There are billions of these Purkinje baThese are Purkinje cells—neurons from the bies floating around in your head right now. cerebellum. Biologist Dana Simmons is fascinatBut no two are alike! Like snowflakes. They ed with these cells because they have many more collect and exchange information with other branches – dendrites – than other neurons. They cells, from day one through your whole life. follow a pattern, called the “Purkinje Pattern,” but Every connection makes them a little bit difthere are endless variations. They line up with great “Kelect”. 2021. Neuron, fluorescent dyes, lasers. Purkinje cells ferent. Like us. precision, not seen anywhere else in the nervous exhibit an extensive branching pattern that is reminiscent Dana Simmons has a Ph.D. in neurobisystem. So why? of other branches seen in nature, such as in trees, coral, and leaves. Simmons created this piece to reflect a pile of autumn ology from the University of Chicago, where Dana Simmons—the artist—is fascinated with leaves, but she represented the leaves using Purkinje cells. she has been researching Autism spectrum disorder. She wants to understand its conAnd you see it in non-biological things like lightnection to the cerebellum. ening. Keep looking and you will see it everywhere. She would like to know where Me, I see the cells as humans, with a head and inspiration comes from. She is arms and legs – like dancers in those old calypso also searching for the answer to movies. You can intuit the sound of the music and the essential question we all have to the voices. And why not see them as humans? It is discover for ourselves. Why? If we like my brain looking at itself. get that, maybe we can figure ourIt’s a revelation to me of how everything is tied selves out. together, wondrously—teetering on the edge of imYou can see more of her work possible. The patterns may or not be universal, online at: www.dana-simmons.com. but they are certainly global. They tie us together as humans. They bind us to the physical earth—to the miracle of creation. Jim Magner’s Thoughts That Dana Simmons (see Artist Profile) sees on Art them as art is as natural as you would view any landPurkinje cell-like patterns are seen scape or figure painting, because that is what they throughout nature. It’s a pattern so are: an art form that reaches for the supernatural. It is ubiquitous you begin to see it everythe spiritual that is somehow inherent in our minds. where, in both big and tiny things. No, all art may not be sacred, but recognizYet each cell is different, just as eving pictures of the living real world, including peoery tree is different. You see the same ple, drawn on a flat surface is a miracle. They are patterns in almost every living and “Viento”. 2016. Neuron, fluorescent dyes, lasers. Simmons filled this somehow captured among the billions of neurons neuron with dye and photographed it using a high-powered microgrowing form, even coral structures. scope. This i a Purkinje cell, the most branched cell type in the brain. we call our brain. From movement and balance, to It can be seen in bacterial colonies. 106 H HILLRAG.COM


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