top of page

featured artist:
Greg Dunn, Ph.D.

 

Greg Dunn, Ph.D.
Neuroscientist, artist
Represented by 

"My non-traditional path to art through a doctorate in neuroscience arms me with an outsider’s perspective and gives me the freedom to  introduce  imagery and concepts derived from a different world than is traditionally encountered in fine art. My work is neonaturalist, art based on natural forms and influenced by scientific advancements that allows us to perceive the universe beyond human senses. Neonaturalism harmonizes unfamiliar scientific imagery and techniques with an experimental artistic scaffolding. For example, it demonstrates that fractal forms of nature are consistent across scale; that neural landscapes of the brain fit seamlessly into the established realm of Asian aesthetics; that expanses of the microscopic world are fundamentally equivalent to landscapes of the macroscopic world.

 

"Neonaturalism fuses the worlds of concept and aesthetics, chaos and order, art and data. This approach visually, conceptually, and  technologically brings the scientific method into design and technique to produce pieces that demonstrate surprising and sometimes beautifully abstract notions about the unseen while commenting on the  common foundations of art and science in communicating human experience. Neonaturalism translates the perpetual stream of inspiration at the cutting edge of scientific research into visceral artistic form to  portray the immense beauty that pervades all corners and all scales of our universe." 


--Greg Dunn, Ph.D.

Self Reflected, 2016, 22K gilded reflective microetching series

Depicting a sagittal slice of the human brain, Self Reflected is the most complex and detailed piece of art on human brain in the world, capturing the connection between the mysterious three pound macroscopic brain and the microscopic behavior of neurons. It offers an unprecedented insight of the brain into itself, revealing the enormous scope of beautiful and delicately balanced neural choreographies designed to reflect what is occurring in our own minds as we observe this work of art. Self Reflected was created to remind us that the most marvelous machine in the known universe is at the core of our being and is the root of our shared humanity.

  • Made of 25 etched plates and required two years to complete. 

  • Contains the circuit dynamics of around 500,000 neurons through a hyper-precise etching technique capable of yielding animations from reflected light, depicts 500 microseconds of “brain time.” 

  • Hand gilded with 1,750 sheets of 22K gold leaf.

  • The appearance of Self Reflected is wholly dependent on its lighting, meaning that it can be displayed in animation or colored light. 

  • Installed with a programmable light array with 144 independently controllable LED fixtures.

  • Is made with a combination of hand drawing, adapted neuro-scientific data, algorithmic simulation of neural circuitry, photolithography, strategic lighting design, and gilding.

Available for purchase:

About the Artist

 

Greg Dunn is an artist who received his PhD in neuroscience from the University of Pennsylvania in 2011. While a graduate student, Dunn’s artistic experiments demonstrated that the qualities of neural forms cleanly fit into the aesthetic principles of minimalist Asian art and sumi-e scroll and gold leaf painting. Dunn is now a full time artist based in Philadelphia where he works to incorporate his knowledge of neuroscience, physics, and biology into the artistic process through imagery, concept, and technique.

 

Together with Dr. Brian Edwards, a collaborating artist, applied physicist and electrical engineer at University of Pennsylvania, Greg invented a revolutionary technique called reflective microetching that allows dynamic control of imagery and color in reflective gold surfaces. This work has led to the awarding of a grant from the National Science Foundation to produce an enormous 8’ x 12’ microetching of the human brain, the most complex and detailed artistic depiction of the brain that will exist in the world. The piece is now permanently installed at the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia

Select exhibitions

 

2016: Self Reflected, the most complex artistic rendition of the human brain in the world. On permanent exhibition in the Your Brain exhibit as of June 2016.

2015: Mind Illuminated at the Mutter Museum (a world famous medical museum in Philadelphia), 2015 for 6 months.

A two year exhibition at the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, MA

2014 - 2015: Science Inspires Art: The Brain, New York

Select awards and press

 

2014: NSF EAGER award - $261,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to conceive and execute the world's most elaborate and detailed piece of art on the brain in the world.

2013: Winner of the National Science and Engineering Visualization Challenge in the illustration category, Science Magazine: (Science magazine is one of the two most respected scientific publications in the world)

2016: Wired, A Gold-Leaf Brain Lights Up With the Awesome Complexity of Neurons

2016, Huffington Post, Giant Artwork Reflects The Gorgeous Complexity of The Human Brain

2016: Philly Voice, Here's the most complex, detailed depiction of the brain in the world

2014: New York Times, Science Events: Dancing Particle Physics and Science-inspired Fashion

2014: American Scientist, Etching the Neural Landscape

2014: Live Science, Dazzling Images of the Brain Created by Neuroscientist-Artist

2013: Wired, You wish your neurons were this pretty

2012: Huffington Post, Neuroscience Art: Greg Dunn’s Neurons Painted In Japanese Sumi-e Style

2011: Neurosurgery, cover essay

Citizen Brooklyn- Neuro-art. The Beauty of the Human Brain

Gallery
Self Reflected
bio

Pranayama, 2014,  24” X 32”, 22K gilded microetching.

 

Uses animated reflected light to depict the movement of subtle energy during meditative breathing exercises. Walking from left to right illustrates the inhale; right to left illustrates the exhale.

Limited edition of 10

US$30,000 (with single overhead light source)

US$35,000 (in custom shadowbox with multicolored light sources)

Pranayama
Brainbow

Brainbow Hippocampus, 2014, 24” X 32” (~34” X 44” X 6” in shadowbox), 22K gilded microetching.

 

Viewable in either a single white light or multicolored mode, this piece depicts the neural structure of the rodent hippocampus, a brain structure involved in learning and memory. Illustrates the brainbow genetic technique wherein every neuron is labeled as a different color.

Limited edition of 20

US$30,000 (with single overhead light source) / US$35,000 (in custom shadowbox with multicolored light sources)

Cortical Circuitboard

Cortical Circuitboard, 2013, 24” X 32”, 22K gilded microetching.

 

This piece comments on the similarities and differences between organic and silicon brains. Uses animated reflective design to depict stylized neurons firing action potentials up and down through the cerebral cortex in an anatomically accurate manner.

 

Limited edition of 15

US$30,000 (with single overhead light source) / US$35,000 (in custom shadowbox with multicolored light sources)

Chaotic Connectome

Chaotic Connectome, 2013, 24” X 28”, (~32” X 38” X 4” in shadowbox), 22K gilded microetching.

 

An abstract neural landscape that uses reflective design and colored lights to illustrate different neural populations.

 

Limited edition of 10

US$27,000 (with single overhead light source) / US$32,000 (in custom shadowbox with multicolored light sources)

Silicon Wafer, 2013,  23” diameter, in custom frame, 22K gilded microetching. 

 

A large scale microetching of a silicon wafer using photolithographic etching processes similar to that used in the manufacture of nanoscale components onto silicon wafers to create microchips.

 

Limited edition of 10

US$27,000 (with single overhead light source)

US$32,000 (in custom shadowbox with multicolored light sources)

Silicon Wafer

Blaze in the Black, 2013,  21” X 29” or 24” X 32”, 22K gilded microetching. 

A reflective microetching that reveals the point in deep meditation where a very quiet mind begins to perceive a bright light. Conceptually, this light is only visible when the viewer is standing at the center of the etching wherein the etching is illuminated with shafts of light emanating from the light source above. Much like the meditator's mind, when agitated, can no longer perceive this light, when the viewer moves off of center the light is no longer visible.

 

Limited edition of 10 (of all sizes)

21” X 29”:

US$20,000 (with single overhead light source)

US$25,000 (in custom shadowbox with multicolored light sources)

24” X 32”:

US$25,000 (with single overhead light source)

US$30,000 (in custom shadowbox with multicolored light sources)

Blaze
Thalamus

Thalamus (Self Reflected, Plate #13), 23.5” X 31”, in custom frame, 22K gilded microetching

 

Limited edition of 100 from the total Self Reflected series

Pricing: inquire

Motor Cortex

Motor Cortex (Self Reflected, Plate #3), 23.5” X 31”, in custom frame, 22K gilded microetching

 

Limited edition of 100 from the total Self Reflected series

Pricing: inquire

Conscious

Conscious (Place)

Can be commissioned as a site-specific piece, to a custom size.  The above is “Conscious Philadelphia” (42” x 58”), as reference. Emergence of consciousness through collective activity. 

videos
Self Reflected, 8'07"
The permanently displayed piece at Franklin Institute
Mind Illuminated,3’26“

Video of exhibition at Mutter Museum

An Introduction to Microetching, 2'47"
other mediums
bottom of page