The eyes of the skin

The eyes of the skin has been written by Prof. Juhani Pallasmaa.

The title speaks volumes for itself. At first, it seems that out of the two senses mentioned in the title, sight is being referred to as the dominant one. As one reads through Pallasmaa’s interpretation of spaces and his ideas on the importance of the other senses and tactility, however ,one understands the title of the book only better.

Through out the first few pages in the book the author talks about the importance of the other senses of our body, how sight seems too be the dominant of all senses and how peripheral vision plays an important role in our experiences of space and architecture.

It is stressed time and again how vision has usurped our understanding of the world and how the other senses are treated as supplementary, through no apparent flaw of their own.

What we feel and hear and smell, usually takes a back seat when it comes to expressing our opinion of a space. He questions this and forces the reader to realize such a blatant flaw in our perception.

He further mentions peripheral vision. He talks about how the experiential quality is moulded by not only sight but hapticity and peripheral vision.

Combing the argument put before, about how sight seems to be dominant of all senses and how peripheral vision should shape our experience, he brings to light the importance of certain things which are slightly recessed. We feel, but we think the experience was a result of what we saw, we are awe inspired and overwhelmed by the Qutab Minar but don’t realize that the Quatb Minar’s scale is only enhanced by its surroundings. The surroundings is what makes the Qutab Minar the awe-inspiring minaret that it is. Take that out, and it is a mere image supplementing the text of some book in our history course.

He very beautifully puts across his views as ‘ focused vision is like a confrontation whereas a peripheral vision lets us into the flesh of the world’.

Further , he quotes many philosophers and thinkers and  their views on the importance and dominance of the skin over other senses.

After reading, go back to the title of the book. The perception of senses changes completely. It seems as if sight is the dominant one and the title seems to imply the same, however, getting a deeper understanding, we realize that the one sense with which we can feel and understand the most is the skin, the properties that the skin has, no other sense has. The eyes provide us with sight, the picture we get only through the eyes is very confrontational, whereas when sight is combined with the other sense, skin or touch,  ‘picture’ starts becoming an experience. The skin has he ability to perceive all the senses together in a manner that the rest do not.

Sight, taste, smell, sound when functioning alone will give us a picture, but the skin is responsible for changing that flat picture into an experience, it takes us from one dimension to another, it

We have forgotten how to perceive ,on an intellectual plane with our skin and thus have managed to submerse ourselves in this “ technological breakdown” where everything is seen and nothing felt.