Trammels | perception is always a transaction

© Mary Snyder Behrens (2005)

Above (with close-up below) Mary Snyder Behrens, one of a series of small (palm-sized) mixed media artworks called Trammels (2005). This is Trammel Box (Home II), made of cloth, thread, and twine in which a box-like metal form is encased.

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E.H. Gombrich, Topics of our Times, pp. 169-170—

Perception is always a transaction between us and the world, and the idea that we could or should ever perceive an image without the preconception or expectations we derive from prior knowledge and experience would resemble the demand that we should make an electric current flow from the positive pole without connecting the wire with the negative pole. The image is one pole, the title often provides the other, and if the set-up works, something new will emerge which is neither the image nor the words, but the product of their interaction.

Detail of the same artwork