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"Looking for the blue e(ph)elant". 2012. Live painting performance on digital pad. 

What if a painting was only a starting point ?  

During the vernissage of his exhibit at the Barclay’s Bank Headquarters in Toulouse, Marc Streichen asked visitors to share with him what images they could “see” in his 40 abstract paintings shown in the exhibit. He painted numerically and live on top of the projected pictures of the chosen paintings to digitally amplify (contrasts, shadows) certain aspects of his original painting according to the vision of the visitor. The result was a new painting made of a combination between the visions of the artist and the spectator. 

From an identical painting, several viewers can can "see" different images. The challenge is to be able to share this vision. Indeed the brain is often as "stuck" in his first vision unable to focus on another. 

The viewer becomes actor and creator using a painting as a starting point.   

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Pareidolia (/pærɪˈdoʊliə/ parr-i-DOH-lee-ə) is the tendency for incorrect perception of a stimulus as an object, pattern or meaning known to the observer, such as seeing shapes in clouds, seeing faces in inanimate objects or abstract patterns, or hearing hidden messages in music. Pareidolia can be considered a subcategory of apophenia.The word derives from the Greek words para (παρά, "beside, alongside, instead [of]") and the noun eidōlon (εἴδωλον "image, form, shape"). Pareidolia was at one time considered a symptom of human psychosis, but it is now seen as a normal human tendency.

A 2009 magnetoencephalography study found that objects perceived as faces evoke an early (165 ms) activation of the fusiform face area at a time and location similar to that evoked by faces, whereas other common objects do not evoke such activation. This activation is similar to a slightly faster time (130 ms) that is seen for images of real faces.  Cognitive processes are activated by the "face-like" object, which alert the observer to both the emotional state and identity of the subject, even before the conscious mind begins to process or even receive the information.Wikipédia

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