They say beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Truth is, everything is in the eye of the beholder. Our eyes receive lightwaves as the input before they transmit those signals to our brains through the optic nerve and into our brains. From there, our brains create a mental model that is built from the visual signals our eyes perceived. What we consider as sight, is essentially that mental model playing and updating itself in our heads repeatedly as our eyes received a constant influx of signals to its photoreceptors, or “light censors.” Of the two kinds of photoreceptors (cones and rods), cones are the one’s responsible for seeing color.

Humans have three types of cones responsible for picking up 3 different light frequencies; they are red, green, and blue. However, a few perfect of the human population (~5%) has issues with at least one of these cones causing what we colloquially know as “color blindness.” Causes of color blindness range from genetic defects to physical trauma of the eyes.In all cases, depending on which cone is missing, or damaged, determines what form of color blindness an individual has.

For this project, I wanted to take inspiration from what happens during color blindness and attempt to showcase it by creating subtle images that would force the viewer to have to look closely to decipher the image while being posing as regular images that would be pleasing to the eye and at the same time be able to convey the perspective of these individuals and allow us the ability to see life as they do so that we may understand and be aware of it.

– J

Red Cones Missing (Protonopia)

“No turn on _____?” 2018.

Combined Green and Blue Cones Missing  (Deuteranopia and Tritanopia)

“Sunset drive-thru.” 2018.

Only Green Cones Missing (Deuteranopia)

“‘Purrrrr’ means ‘eye see you’ in feline.” 2018.

Mostly Red Cones Left (Artistic rendition combined with Tritanopia)

“Seeing Red.” 2018.