PALINOPSIA
REBECCA WARD - 2012
PALINOPSIA is a visual disturbance that causes images to persist after their corresponding stimulus has left. These images are known as afterimages and occur in persons with normal vision. This means that everything we see is a subtle blend of what is happening now and what happened a fraction of a second ago. A person with Palinopsia however experiences afterimages to a greater degree, to the point where they become difficult or impossible to ignore. Any sufferer of Paliopsia is literally trapped between the present and the past in a surreal world where what they see bears only a passing relation to physical reality.
My vision creates an illusion of movement and layers as seen by someone experiencing Palinopsia. By building garments comprised of multiple layers, I use the garment as a metaphore of the layers of time, and of vision, which combine to create new shapes and forms.
The wearer of the garment is literally trapped in between the past and the present, with the combined layers
merging to create a new reality which they now exist within.
