A lesson on looking Amy Herman
Take a look at this work of art.
What is it that you see?
At first glance, it looks
to be a grandfather clock
with a sheet thrown over it
and a rope tied around the center.
But a first look always warrants a second.
Look again.
What do you see now?
If you look more closely,
you’ll realize
that this entire work of art
is made from one piece of sculpture.
There is no clock,
there is no rope,
and there is no sheet.
It is one piece of bleached
Honduras mahogany.
Now let me be clear:
this exercise was not
about looking at sculpture.
It’s about looking
and understanding
that looking closely can save a life,
change your company
and even help you understand
why your children behave the way they do.
It’s a skill that I call
visual intelligence,
and I use works of art to teach everybody,
from everyday people
to those for whom looking is the job,
like Navy SEALs and homicide
detectives and trauma nurses.
The fact is that no matter how skilled
you might be at looking,
you still have so much
to learn about seeing.
Because we all think we get it
in a first glance and a sudden flash,
but the real skill is in understanding
how to look slowly
and how to look more carefully.
The talent is in remembering –
in the crush of the daily urgencies
that demand our attention –
to step back and look through
those lenses to help us see
what we’ve been missing all along.
So how can looking at painting
and sculpture help?
Because art is a powerful tool.
It’s a powerful tool
that engages both sight and insight
and reframes our understanding
of where we are and what we see.
Here’s an example of a work of art
that reminded me
that visual intelligence –
it’s an ongoing learning process
and one that really is never mastered.
I came across this quiet,
seemingly abstract painting,
and I had to step up to it twice,
even three times,
to understand why it resonated so deeply.
Now, I’ve seen the Washington Monument
in person thousands of times,
well aware of the change in the color
of marble a third of the way up,
but I had never really looked
at it out of context
or truly as a work of art.
And here, Georgia O’Keeffe’s painting
of this architectural icon made me realize
that if we put our mind to it,
it’s possible to see everyday things
in a wholly new
and eye-opening perspective.
Now, there are some skeptics that believe
that art just belongs in an art museum.
They believe that it has no practical
use beyond its aesthetic value.
I know who they are
in every audience I teach.
Their arms are crossed,
their legs are crossed,
their body language is saying,
“What am I going to learn
from this lady who talks fast
about painting and sculpture?”
So how do I make it relevant for them?
I ask them to look at this work of art,
like this portrait by Kumi Yamashita.
And I ask them to step in close,
and even closer still,
and while they’re looking
at the work of art,
they need to be asking questions
about what they see.
And if they ask the right questions,
like, “What is this work of art?
Is it a painting? Is it a sculpture?
What is it made of?” …
they will find out
that this entire work of art
is made of a wooden board,
10,000 nails
and one unbroken piece of sewing thread.
Now that might be
interesting to some of you,
but what does it have to do
with the work that these people do?
And the answer is everything.
Because we all interact with people
multiple times on a daily basis,
and we need to get better
at asking questions
about what it is that we see.
Learning to frame
the question in such a way
as to elicit the information
that we need to do our jobs,
is a critical life skill.
Like the radiologist who told me
that looking at the negative
spaces in a painting
helped her discern
more discreet abnormalities in an MRI.
Or the police officer who said
that understanding the emotional dynamic
between people in a painting
helped him to read body language
at a domestic violence crime scene,
and it enabled him to think twice
before drawing and firing his weapon.
And even parents can look to see
absences of color in paintings
to understand that
what their children say to them
is as important as what they don’t say.
So how do I –
how do I train to be
more visually intelligent?
It comes down to four As.
Every new situation, every new problem –
we practice four As.
First, we assess our situation.
We ask, “What do we have in front of us?”
Then, we analyze it.
We say, “What’s important?
What do I need? What don’t I need?”
Then, we articulate it in a conversation,
in a memo, in a text, in an email.
And then, we act: we make a decision.
We all do this multiple times a day,
but we don’t realize what a role
seeing and looking plays
in all of those actions,
and how visual intelligence
can really improve everything.
So recently, I had a group
of counterterrorism officials
at a museum in front of this painting.
El Greco’s painting,
“The Purification of the Temple,”
in which Christ, in the center,
in a sweeping and violent gesture,
is expelling the sinners
from the temple of prayer.
The group of counterterrorism officials
had five minutes with that painting,
and in that short amount of time,
they had to assess the situation,
analyze the details,
articulate what, if anything,
they would do if they were
in that painting.
As you can imagine,
observations and insights differed.
Who would they talk to?
Who would be the best witness?
Who was a good potential witness?
Who was lurking?
Who had the most information?
But my favorite comment
came from a seasoned cop
who looked at the central figure and said,
“You see that guy in the pink?” –
referring to Christ –
he said, “I’d collar him,
he’s causing all the trouble.”
(Laughter)
So looking at art gives us a perfect
vehicle to rethink how we solve problems
without the aid of technology.
Looking at the work
of Felix Gonzalez-Torres,
you see two clocks
in perfect synchronicity.
The hour, minute and
second hand perfectly aligned.
They are installed side by side
and they’re touching,
and they are entitled
“‘Untitled’ (Perfect Lovers).”
But closer analysis makes you realize
that these are two
battery-operated clocks,
which in turn makes you understand –
“Hey, wait a minute …
One of those batteries
is going to stop before the other.
One of those clocks is going
to slow down and die before the other
and it’s going to alter
the symmetry of the artwork.”
Just articulating that thought process
includes the necessity
of a contingency plan.
You need to have contingencies
for the unforeseen,
the unexpected and the unknown,
whenever and however they may happen.
Now, using art to increase
our visual intelligence
involves planning for contingencies,
understanding the big picture
and the small details
and noticing what’s not there.
So in this painting by Magritte,
noticing that there are no tracks
under the train,
there is no fire in the fireplace
and there are no candles
in the candlesticks
actually more accurately
describes the painting
than if you were to say, “Well,
there’s a train coming out of a fireplace,
and there are candlesticks on the mantle.”
It may sound counterintuitive
to say what isn’t there,
but it’s really a very valuable tool.
When a detective who had learned
about visual intelligence
in North Carolina
was called to the crime scene,
it was a boating fatality,
and the eyewitness told this detective
that the boat had flipped over
and the occupant had drowned underneath.
Now, instinctively, crime scene
investigators look for what is apparent,
but this detective
did something different.
He looked for what wasn’t there,
which is harder to do.
And he raised the question:
if the boat had really
tipped flipped over –
as the eyewitness said that it did –
how come the papers that were kept
at one end of the boat
were completely dry?
Based on that one small
but critical observation,
the investigation shifted
from accidental death to homicide.
Now, equally important
to saying what isn’t there
is the ability to find visual connections
where they may not be apparent.
Like Marie Watt’s totem pole of blankets.
It illustrates that finding hidden
connections in everyday objects
can resonate so deeply.
The artist collected blankets
from all different people
in her community,
and she had the owners
of the blankets write, on a tag,
the significance of
the blanket to the family.
Some of the blankets
had been used for baby blankets,
some of them had been used
as picnic blankets,
some of them had been used for the dog.
We all have blankets in our homes
and understand the significance
that they play.
But similarly, I instruct new doctors:
when they walk into a patient’s room,
before they pick up that medical chart,
just look around the room.
Are there balloons or cards,
or that special blanket on the bed?
That tells the doctor there’s a connection
to the outside world.
If that patient has someone
in the outside world
to assist them and help them,
the doctor can implement the best care
with that connection in mind.
In medicine, people
are connected as humans
before they’re identified
as doctor and patient.
But this method of enhancing perception –
it need not be disruptive,
and it doesn’t necessitate
an overhaul in looking.
Like Jorge Méndez Blake’s sculpture
of building a brick wall
above Kafka’s book “El Castillo”
shows that more astute observation
can be subtle and yet invaluable.
You can discern the book,
and you can see
how it disrupted the symmetry
of the bricks directly above it,
but by the time you get
to the end of the sculpture,
you can no longer see the book.
But looking at the work of art
in its entirety,
you see that the impact
of the work’s disruption on the bricks
is nuanced and unmistakable.
One thought,
one idea,
one innovation can alter an approach,
change a process
and even save lives.
I’ve been teaching visual intelligence
for over 15 years,
and to my great amazement
and astonishment –
to my never-ending astonishment
and amazement,
I have seen that looking at art
with a critical eye
can help to anchor us in our world
of uncharted waters,
whether you are a paramilitary trooper,
a caregiver, a doctor or a mother.
Because let’s face it, things go wrong.
(Laughter)
Things go wrong.
And don’t misunderstand me,
I’d eat that doughnut in a minute.
(Laughter)
But we need to understand the consequences
of what it is that we observe,
and we need to convert observable details
into actionable knowledge.
Like Jennifer Odem’s sculpture
of tables standing sentinel
on the banks of the Mississippi River
in New Orleans,
guarding against the threat
of post-Katrina floodwaters
and rising up against adversity,
we too have the ability
to act affirmatively
and affect positive change.
I have been mining the world of art
to help people across
the professional spectrum
to see the extraordinary in the everyday,
to articulate what is absent
and to be able to inspire
creativity and innovation,
no matter how small.
And most importantly,
to forge human connections
where they may not be apparent,
empowering us all to see our work
and the world writ large
with a new set of eyes.
Thank you.
(Applause)