These are large-scale, 100% pure silk scarves, 140 x 140 cm (55 x 55 in). Given their size, they are more properly called wraps (skraistės in Lithuanian). The silk used is of the highest quality with silk twill weaving. The printing techniques are state of the art.
For forty years I have been artistically exploring the origins of thinking, of consciousness. How is it that we are aware of ourselves, of others? How is it that social interactions, culture and civilizations arise? What is it that makes us human? These silk NeuroArt scarves are the latest iteration of my artistic explorations. I am taking art off gallery and museum walls, and bringing it out for the general public to use and enjoy.
All of these silk works of art, just as all my previous works, have multiple overlapping, interweaving layers of content, meaning and visual elements. Complexity of their design and content matches the complexity of our own thought processes.
This piece is in honor of the one-hundred-year anniversary of the birth of Marija Gimbutas. Four decades ago, I created an outdoor stone installation, in a flooded area of Quarry Hill Park in Rochester, Minnesota. The distribution of the stones was in keeping with ancient Lithuanian burial sites that Marija Gimbutas had researched and used in her doctoral dissertation. A photograph of this installation is the underlying image behind the neuronal profiles. In the center of the work, at the top, is a stylized letter M standing for Marija.