I’m thrilled to be participating in the Extreme Imagination conference, which is put on by the Aphantasia Network and is dedicated to the study of aphantasia and hyperphantasia. I’m really excited to learn more about what’s going on w/ this burgeoning field of research, and to connect w/ other artists who are variously on this spectrum.
Here’s what I wrote about my imagination in conjunction with my participation in this conference:
In my youth, I assumed that my brain didn’t waste time on visual imagery because I was so focused on music, sound, and story. At the ripe old age of forty, I’m a bit more fatalistic: music and narrative occupy my mind because they’re the most vivid and vibrant things a mind without visual imagery can conjure. It seems as if, having no mind’s eye, my mind’s ear has access to much of its processing power! I have no scientific evidence for this, of course — only a half a lifetime of ever-heightening imagination that allows me the ability to understand and sculpt narrative forms in my head. These narrative forms consist of both musical and non-musical material, which means that songwriting, that perfect combination of sound and story, is my most natural art.
I’ll be on an artist panel and doing a Blix Byrd performance. Exciting!