Dopamine: The Brain’s “Love” Chemical Shell
The British neurobiologist Semir Zeki at University College London coined the term neuroaesthetics to define the intersection of brain and art. An interdisciplinary field, it’s a cognitive neuroscience that investigates the biological and neural foundations of aesthetic experiences, specifically how the brain perceives, processes, and responds to beauty, art, and creative works. It bridges psychology, art, and neuroscience to understand why certain sensory experiences trigger pleasure, emotion, and deep engagement.

One of the most striking findings in neuroaesthetics comes from Zeki’s brain imaging studies that showed that when people look at artworks they find beautiful, the same reward centers of the brain become active as when they experience romantic love. In both cases, there’s a rush of dopamine, the neurotransmitter tied to pleasure and desire. 

This means that staring at a Botticelli masterpiece or the unicorn tapestries or a breathtaking abstract isn’t just emotionally moving—it’s biochemically rewarding in a way that overlaps with the experience of being in love.

The Reward System and Emotional Engagement
When we fall for someone, multiple systems in the brain fire in concert: reward pathways, emotion centers, and memory circuits. Research suggests that engaging with art activates many of these same networks. Dopamine release, increased blood flow in pleasure-related areas, and even physiological reactions like relaxed breathing or a racing heart are all part of the picture. 

This isn’t just about liking something—it’s about deep emotional resonance. The brain’s reward system doesn’t discriminate between stimuli coming from a beloved person or a powerful work of art. That’s why great art can make us feel “high” or euphoric, much like early love does.

Another key aspect of neuroaesthetics is the investigation of how specific elements of art, such as symmetry, color, and composition, influence aesthetic judgments. For example, studies have found that symmetrical patterns are often perceived as more attractive, likely due to the brain’s preference for order and predictability. Similarly, color and contrast have been shown to significantly impact aesthetic preferences and emotional responses.

Emotion, Empathy, and the Social Brain
But neuroscience doesn’t stop at pleasure. Recent studies show that art activates regions associated with empathy and social cognition, the same areas involved when we form emotional bonds with others. Art draws us into imagined worlds, invites us to feel with its subjects, and resonates with our own personal memories and emotions. 

This might explain why a painting depicting a glance or a gesture can evoke feelings of connection, longing, or even heartbreak—mirroring the emotional investment we experience in real relationships.

Mirror Neurons: Feeling What We See
One fascinating mechanism behind this effect is the role of mirror neurons. These neurons fire not only when we perform an action, but when we observe an action. That means when we watch a figure in a painting weeping or embracing, parts of our brain simulate the experience—almost as if we were there ourselves. 

This neural mirroring deepens our emotional engagement and helps explain why art can evoke love-like responses: it’s not just cognitive—our bodies participate, too.

The Aesthetic and the Romantic: A Shared Neural Landscape
Love is complex—more than chemistry, it’s a neurobiological symphony involving reward, memory, emotion, and social cognition. What’s remarkable is how closely this symphony mirrors the neural response to intense aesthetic experience.

Art connects. It rewards. It moves us. And if the next time poetry makes your chest tighten or a sculpture catches your breath, you feel that all-too-familiar flutter—you’re not imagining it. Your brain might just be engaging in its own kind of romance.

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In recapping those intriguing offerings, we begin with Keiji Nio’s captivating Cat’s Eyes. Nio is captivated by these enigmatic animals. “When I suddenly feel a gaze and turn my eyes, I sometimes find a cat staring intently at me,” he says. “Especially quiet cats, who do not meow much, whooften keep their expression unchanged, gazing without blinking, as if trying to convey something unknowable. When I return the gaze, there are moments when we slowly exchange blinks.” Nio sought to confront his memories and emotional response to cats through images he silk-screened onto aramid fabric, with which he created a wall work edged in sand.

Polly Barton finds solace in following the thread, which she calls “a kind of wayfinding.” She creates a surface to rub color in a variety of forms; dye, pigment, pastel, ink. “Working at the loom where my threads are in order and my fingers work with what feels real, chaos is temporarily kept at bay,” she says. No Strings Attached began as a small watercolor sketch — a memory of petroglyphs — field notes from the past carved into basalt stones found while hiking paths in canyons. “My sketch,” she says,”like a voice from the past, beckoned to be woven as a fluid path forward into our spinning world. In my studio, Sheryl Crow sings: ‘Everyday is a winding road.I get a little bit closer … to what is really real.’

Peak in the Clouds, is the first of a short series of “landforms,” that Christine Joy started in 2022 when she was on Washington Island, Wisconsin at a willow-gathering retreat. (You can read more about Joy’s willow-gatherine process in an earlier arttextstyle post.) She picked up the rock on the shores of Lake Superior noting that it was very different rock there than in Montana where she lives. “It was so black, sparkly, and geometric with a sharp point,” she says. “It occurred to me that rocks are just small landscapes. I started weaving around the rock during the retreat. Then, I let it sit for over a year; I just didn’t have the right color willow to work on it.” Eventually, she added more yellow. “I really like the color, like sunset in the clouds. The yellow changes colors slowly as it dries, losing some of its vibrancy, but blending better with the brown willow.” 

Caroline Bartlett explores the historical, social, and cultural associations of textiles, their significance in relation to touch and their ability to trigger memory, in her work. She Imprints, stitches, erases, and reworks cloth, folding and unfolding, and often integrating textiles with other media such as porcelain. Her new work, Juncture, she says, “suggests ‘a point of time, especially one made critical or important by a concurrence of circumstances’ while disjuncture suggests ‘a disconnection between two things. The language of textiles speaks of entanglements and connectivity, of continuity and severance, and pink might be considered as a field for nurture. Blocks of intersecting color are revealed through a manipulated surface and hold firm with concepts of control. Simultaneously, they become squeezed and threads displaced as notions of old certainties and understandings fall away. The whole becomes a metaphor for the personal or for the wider social, ecological, and political sphere.”

Thanks again to all the artists we work with who continually send us such marvelous work. Keep watching; we’re committed to showing and sharing more art online and in person.

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As the mix between red’s passion and white’s purity, traditionally, pink symbolizes love, nurture and compassion. It also evokes feelings of comfort, warmth and hope. And these are the themes that many of our artists were channeling in these unsettling times. 

“The language of textiles speaks of entanglements and connectivity ” explains Caroline Bartlett, “of continuity and severance, and pink might be considered as a field for nurture.” For Bartlett, her work Juncture, suggests “a point of time, especially one made critical or important by a concurrence of circumstances.”

Stéphanie Jacques works with a dark pink wire cable in works like Retournement en cours IV to create figures that illustrate transformation. “The cable consists of two twisted copper wires sheathed in plastic film; one white, the other dark pink,” she says. “The varnish that covers them gives a beautiful finish. Sometimes the white is twisted with a red or orange thread, but it’s the dark pink that I prefer.”

Polly Barton’s Pivot is imbued with pink and other colors. Barton finds solace in “[C]reating a surface to rub color in a variety of forms; dye, pigment, pastel, ink. I weave the liminal space between a painted surface and the woven structure.”

Totems, by Wlodimierz Cygan, is a study in color — pink is only one of the shades it reveals through fiber optic lighting. “The introduction of the motif of changing light into this system,” he observes, “turned this small weaving form into a magical, magnetizing object, encouraging meditation.”

Neha Puri Dhir writes eloquently about the color in her work Shifting Horizons. This intimate textile artwork, inspired by Akbar Padamsee’s Metascapes, transforms handwoven silk into a whisper of unseen change. “I have painted the silk with earthy colors,” she says, “gentle teals for my quiet unease, warm yellows for a flicker of hope, and soft pinks for the tender ache in my heart — capturing a shift I feel but cannot see, like a storm brewing beyond the horizon.”

In her work, Emotional Summer, which includes pink and other pastels, Young-ok Shin has a message to convey. “I want to express the power passed down from tradition as work full of vitality that is given meaning, rather than innovation.”

Also expressing a message are Shed on Ice and Dark Shed. “Since moving to a rural community in southern Indiana nearly 20 years ago,” Laura Foster Nicholson reports, “I continue to be fascinated by the simple forms and light of the landscapes.” The mood in Shed on Ice, with its early-morning, rose-colored sky reflects Nicholson’s concern about climate change. “The farms, which seem so evocatively beautiful,” she says, “are contributing radically to climate change.”

You can see more on our website: browngrotta.com.

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This month, our New This Week series has introduced work from four brilliant artists—Lizzie Farey, Lawrence LaBianca, Caroline Bartlett, and Birgit Birkkjær. Let’s take a moment to revisit their featured works, each of which brings something unique to the world of contemporary art.

We kicked off January by featuring the talented Scottish artist Lizzie Farey, renowned for her innovative use of natural materials in her sculptural works. Known for her exceptional skill in weaving and creating intricate forms from willow, birch, and other locally sourced fibers, Farey’s work explores the intersection of nature and art.

Her sculptures evoke a deep connection to the land and reflect her commitment to sustainable practices. Lizzie’s weaving techniques create organic, flowing forms that are both visually striking and rooted in the traditions of her craft. Her work continues to captivate, as it brings the natural world indoors, transforming raw materials into art that speaks to both the environment and the human spirit.

We then turned out attentino to the captivating work of Lawrence LaBianca, whose sculptures intertwine text and form in a way that sparks both intellectual and emotional engagement. LaBianca’s Call Me Ishmael piece, inspired by Herman Melville’s Moby Dick, was a focal point this month, offering a layered narrative that weaves literary history into contemporary sculpture. The piece invites viewers to explore the intersection of language, memory, and visual art, encouraging reflection on both personal and collective stories.

LaBianca’s ability to transform literature into a physical experience through sculptural work continues to resonate, and we’re thrilled to have featured his thought-provoking art in January.

In mid-January, we turned our spotlight to the work of Caroline Bartlett, an artist whose weaving practice defies convention by blending textile art with elements of sculpture and painting. Bartlett’s intricate, handwoven pieces explore the relationships between form, space, and color, creating works that evoke calmness and balance. Her Curves and Lines series, with its harmonious geometry and nuanced color palette, captivates viewers and brings a sense of movement within the stillness of the woven fibers.

Bartlett’s unique approach to weaving and her innovative use of materials continue to set her work apart in the contemporary textile art world. 

To close out January, we showcased the minimalist beauty of Birgit Birkkjær’s work, particularly her piece Agua Azul 47. Birkkjær’s approach to weaving combines traditional craft with a modern aesthetic, using materials like linen, cotton, and horsehair to create intricate geometric patterns that seem to shift and evolve with the viewer’s perspective. Her work stands as a testament to the power of repetition and precision, capturing a sense of movement while maintaining a serene, contemplative quality.

Birkkjær’s ability to balance simplicity with depth continues to inspire, and we were honored to feature her stunning art this month.

As we wrap up January, we’d like to thank you for being part of our journey as we continue to share and celebrate the works of incredible artists. Stay tuned as we bring even more exciting new art in the coming months, and we look forward to sharing more inspiring stories with you as we move through 2025.

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Wendy Wahl had two 2024 book recommendations to share. “Many years ago, while at Haystack Mountain School of Crafts, I discovered Mysteries of the Alphabet by Marc-Alain Ouaknin (Abbeville Press, 1999).

I was as interested then as I am today in the world of alphabets and their origins. This compact book is a compilation of signs, symbols, and pictograms that have been a part of the evolution of letters and their meaning over the past 3,500 years.” In 2021, Wahl made a piece called Equine Calligraphy, composed of hand-gathered and manipulated horsehair stitched to paper with strands of the same hair. She found a category for this kind of work when she came across Asemic: The Art of Writing by Peter Schwenger. The book is a survey of contemporary asemic writing and its place between art and recognizable script. [Cliff Notes version — asemic means writing without language.] The book was ecstatically reviewed: “vital and fateful;” “engaging and groundbreaking.” https://www.artnews.com/art-in-america/aia-reviews/asemic-writing-peter-schwenger-cy-twombly-roland-barthes-1202688046/.

“I was excited to realize that browngrotta arts’ artist Marian Bijlenga‘s artwork was used for the book’s cover,” Wahl wrote. browngrotta arts carries a book by Bijlenga, Written Weed, containing collages by the artist made of dried leaves, grasses, and seeds. The images are like handwriting, Chinese characters, the letters of an alphabet.

Gyöngy Laky is another artist who is interested in alphabets and messaging without recognizable forms as in the work Notes to Self. Author David Roth, says “her use of language is decidedly postmodern, seen in how she presents symbols and signs as inherently porous and unstable, subject to all the forces that influence perception and thought.” 

(“The Architecture of Thought,” David M. Roth, in Gyöngy Laky, Screwing with Order: assembled art, actions and creative practice, arnoldsche, 2022).

Heidrun Schimmel creates  “pages” of stitches that appear to be writing, but are not.

Caroline Bartlett has explored text/nontext works, too. 

These books and artworks offer novel ways to explore how art, words and communication combine.

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“With all sorts of ideas behind them, artists continue to challenge the idea, content, and structure of the traditional book,” observed Anne Evenhaugen, in Unbound, the Smithsonian Libraries and Archives, online newsletter in 2012 (https://blog.library.si.edu/blog/2012/06/01/what-is-an-artists-book/). Several artists who work with browngrotta arts do all that to books and more. Below are some examples of how the printed page forms or features in their work.

For some it’s a literal homage. John McQueen makes actual books of twigs and waxed linen. Their pages turn and the words on the pages can be read. Caroline Bartlett’s version is more of an idea, a memory, than an actual book. In  her Overwritings series, cotton thread, plastered fabric, matchsticks, and waxed resisted silk fragments create marks that reference text that viewers are left to decode. The volumes in Lewis Knauss’ Book series also read as books, but are even more abstract. Knauss uses linen, hemp, Japanese paper, and shellac to create ruffled pages without text. Mercedes Vicente uses notebook paper to create a book and a thin black cord to “write” on the pages.

Other artists use the printed page as material. For Toshio Sekiji, it’s newspapers, book jackets, and maps that make up his collage/weavings. He explores the merge of cultures in his works. New stories are created atop the old he says, by reading the strips of paper he chooses and the areas he enhances with lacquer. Encyclopedia pages are used as Wendy Wahl‘s as material. “… [t]he leaves may be stacked into forms that suggest an alternative forest of knowledge or tightly scrolled and packed within a frame, making for a composition that suggests a cabinet of hidden knowledge, those archives of information that are at once visible and concealed, at hand and remote.” Akiko Busch, wrote in our catalog, 10th Wave III.  Naomi Kobayashi creates her own text, then incorporates it into delicate weavings. In a true “art imitates life imitates art” moment, a collector of her work who is a writer asked a technical question. If the work were unraveled, could the text be read? Yes, the artist answered and it became a plot twist — in his book, Hiding in the Weave, a student’s tapestry has to be unwoven to discover a clue to her death.

Lawrence LaBianca looks at books from different vantage points. In Thesaurus, he posits a slice of a tree with its mirror image in glass as book pages that can be read. What Lies Beneath, is a bit tongue in cheek. In this work, he considers an iconic book, Moby Dick, from the perspective of fish. He sent it into the ocean in a waterproof box and filmed it in place.

Francis Bacon got it right in our view, when he said, “Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some are to be chewed and digested.” (Essays (1625)) Bacon’s Essays By Francis Bacon, Richard Whately.) Those are just some of the options available to artists considering books as inspiration. As viewers, we are left to anticipate and appreciate the works that result.

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This German artist, Heidrun Schimmel, consistently impresses us with her detailed, handstitched artwork. Her ideas often stem from the soft, unstable and flexible qualities of the textile materials she works with. For the realization of her ideas, she stitches white cotton thread by hand onto transparent silk; which she has noted to be the simplest material and simplest technique: the stitch.

When asked about her process, Schimmel stated:

“Stitching by hand exclusively, I take my ideas from specific qualities of the thread and the stitching process. Behind the Lines of Thread shows the so-called “left side” of the thread lines. The tensions between these thread lines protect the “right side,” which the viewer cannot see. Each piece has its own individual shape and at the same time it enters into a relationship with all the other parts. “

Up next, we have the innovative work of UK textile artist, Caroline Bartlett. With textiles at the core of her practice, Bartlett’s artwork is often created in reference to historical, social and cultural associations. Bartlett’s practice is driven by questions – for example around the tensions between personal recollection and the public ways of remembrance and the potential of materials and objects to trigger recollection and association.

“As age and experience expand, I find myself more aware of how I work,” said Caroline Bartlett. “I continue to actively need fresh challenges while knowing and recognizing limitations of self and the art world in general. Again the push/pull. No room for complacency.”

What a profound lens into her creative practice!

Tacitum II was created by acclaimed artist, Sue Lawty. Lawty is an England-based artist who is widely known for her meticulous exploration of the mediums she works with.

She has charted the journey of her understated and abstract works – stating that they are strongly influenced by a comprehensive engagement with remote landscape, geology and the passage of time.

Lawty’s work is rooted in the emotional, spiritual, and physical engagement with land through construction and repetitive structure, and the inspired creation behind her pieces shows!

This next piece holds a special place in our hearts as it comes from the late Zofia Butrymowicz. Butrymowicz has been recognized globally for her innovative works in the ‘60s and ‘70s – often using thread she spun herself in Poland during the post-war period when supplies were in a great shortage.

This work is made from wool sourced from Canadian artist, Mariette Rousseau-Vermette. Back in 1969, Butrymowicz visited Canadian weaver, Mariette Rousseau-Vermette and her husband, painter and ceramicist, Claude Vermette, outside Montreal where the couple lived and worked. Zofia stayed with the Vermettes for several months, using Mariette’s looms to create tapestries that were displayed with Claude’s ceramics at a local gallery.

To create this piece, Zofia “painted” the weavings made from Canadian wool with colors and shadings of yarns, including only a shimmering suggestion of a shape, often a circle, as she had done in other tapestries, but the glisten and sumptuousness of the yarn from Rousseau-Vermette used in this particular piece sets it apart from her other works.

Last, but not least, we highlighte the work of Włodzimierz Cygan. Cygan is known globally for his textile innovations. Growing up, Cygan lived in a city in Poland called Łódź, which has very strong textile traditions that inspired him to create the works of art you see today.

“When trying to determine why the means of artistic expression in tapestry was becoming archaic,” said Cygan, “I realized that one of the reasons might have to do with the custom of treating the threads of the weft as the chief medium of the visual message. . . . These observations led me to wonder how the artistic language of textiles might benefit from a warp whose strands would not be parallel and flat but convergent, curved or three dimensional ….”

As a result of these explorations, in some of Cygan’s works, the warp changes direction, enabling the weaving of circles or arcs.

We hope you enjoyed learning about these prominent contemporary artist.s If you like what we have highlighted this month, keep your eye out for more – we keep them coming every week.

In the meantime, mark your calendar for our upcoming Art in the Barn event, Allies for Art: Work from NATO-related countries (October 8-16, 2022), it’s an event you won’t want to miss! Click here for more information and to reserve your spot.

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This year we’ve gathered our art selections into a clickable lookbook format. Whether you are gifting yourself, a friend or family member, a work of art makes a truly unique choice. Our curated collection includes art for every location, including crowdpleasing centerpieces (Rocking the Table) and coveted items to set on a bookshelf (Boosting a Bookshelf) or counter top (Counter Balancing). 

We’ve included art suggestions to fill special spots — including those often hard-to-fill narrow walls (On the Straight and Narrow). Our choices include a pleated fabric work by Caroline Bartlett of the UK and a hanging of hand-painted threads by Ulla-Maija Vikman, known as “Finland’s colorist.” Or have you got your eye on an empty space? The one that makes you think — “I wish I could find just the right piece of art for that spot.” We’ve got a batch of ideas for you there — from embellished photographs by Gyöngy Laky(US) to an intricate embroidery by Scott Rothstein(US) to a newsprint and lacquer collage by Toshio Sekiji of Japan.

There are works at every price point, from the brightly colored abstract tapestry, Flow, by Jo Barker, a Cordis Prize winner from the UK to a basket sculpture of cottonwood by Christine Joy(US) to a new book about the innovative weaver Włodzimierz Cygan of Poland.

Take a look here: http://www.browngrotta.com/digitalfolios/HolidayFlipBook/Hoilday FlipBook 2021.html

The small print:

Order for the holidays by December 13th and we’ll ship by December 14th for domestic delivery by the holidays (though due to COVID and other delays, we can’t guaranteed the shippers’ schedule). If you’d like us to gift wrap your purchase, email us at art@browngrotta.com, as soon as you have placed your order. To ensure we know you want gift wrapping, don’t wait to contact us — we generally ship as soon as the orders are received. Quantities are limited.

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CAROLINE BARTLETT: A Restless Dynamic
Through December 11, 2021
Crafts Study Centre
University for the Creative Arts
Falkner Road
Farnham, Surrey GU9 7DS UK
T +44 (0) 1252 891450
https://www.csc.uca.ac.uk

Caroline Bartlett’s practice is driven by questions – for example around the tensions between personal recollection and the public ways of remembrance and the potential of materials and objects to trigger recollection and association. In this exhibition, curated by Professor Lesley Millar, Director of the International Textile Research Centre, Bartlett will be showing new work exploring ideas around continuity and change as a concept. While her response to the collection of the Crafts Study Centre started with the notion of investigating the work of Lucie Rie, this process was disrupted by the onset of the Covid Pandemic, leading her to reflect on the “ecology” of practice as it shifts between continuity and change, deliberate or otherwise and the indeterminates that destabilize the context of production. Included in the exhibition is Stilled which she made as a site-sensitive response to the Spinning Room at Salts Mill for the exhibition Cloth and Memory.

Connected Cloth: exploring the global nature of textiles
Through November 28, 2021
The Whitaker
Haslingden Road
Lancashire BB4 6RE UK
Tel: 01706260785 
Email: info@thewhitaker.org 

The theme of this year’s event by the, 62 Group of Textile Artists 

(http://www.62group.org.uk) focuses on the global context of textiles, textile production and the relationships textiles create both historically and now. The 62 Group is a highly regarded artists exhibiting group that aims to challenge the boundaries of textile practice through an ambitious and innovative annual program of exhibitions. Membership of the group is nternational and currently includes artists from Canada, Japan, Netherlands, Germany, Hungary, South Africa and USA. In Connected Cloth, members of the 62 Group have created new artworks that investigate this theme from a wide range of viewpoints and in divergent textile media, challenging viewers to consider the role that textile plays in all our lives and the many unexpected ways we find connection through cloth.

Sharon Brown: Stitched Stories
Through October 2021
Queen Street Mill Textile Museum
Queen Street 
Burnley, BB10 2HX UK
https://events.lancashire.gov.uk/search/event_details.asp?eventid=10060&q=btb&area=allVenue&venue=Queen+St+Mill+Textile+Museum&daterange=

Sharon Brown presents new work at Queen Street Mill which reimagines found letters and documents connected to the history and workers of Lancashire cotton mills. Using freehand machine embroidery, Sharon celebrates and preserves fragments of the skills, structures and rhythms of generations of often forgotten lives spent working in the textile industry. Drawing with the sewing machine, creating layers of stitch that capture layers of history, these handwritten fragile papers reveal not only personal histories but also glimpses of global events and the social and cultural context in which they were written. Every Thursday, Friday and Saturday of BTB21 Sharon will be on-site at Queen Street Mill working with her sewing machine to create a growing display of new textile work.

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Carolina Yrarrázaval is a Chilean artist known for her impeccable textile work. When asked about her work and her aspirations, Yrarrázaval said:

“Throughout my entire artistic career I have devoted myself to investigating traditional textile techniques from diverse cultures, especially Pre-Columbian techniques, trying to adapt them to my creative needs,” said Carolina Yrarrázaval. “Abstraction has always been present as an aesthetic aim, informing my choice of materials, forms, textures and colors. The simple proportions are guided by an intuitive sense that avoids the use of mathematical formulas.”

Włodzimierz Cygan is a Polish artist who’s widely known for his intriguing and detailed weaving and tapestry work. Growing up, Cygan lived in a city called Łódź, which has very strong textile traditions that inspired him to create his own works of art.  “I use optical fiber mono-filament with increased light transmission for warp and weft as a complementary material for the textile structure, “ says the artist. In doing so, he is able to connect two contradictions: durability of textile materials and a constant change of the light. 

Caroline Bartlett is a UK artist who’s widely known for her textile work – which provides the means and materials to process and articulate ideas in relation to content in reference to historical, social and cultural associations. These have significance in relation to touch and their ability to trigger memory in Bartlett’s work, imprinting, erasing and reworking, stitching, folding and unfolding become defining characteristics.

At browngrotta arts, we’re excited to begin the new year and to continue to bring forth art that inspires and incites emotion. We’re determined to continue to bring light into the world with art that connects us all as one. Keep your eye out for all the exciting things to come!

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