Illusions, the exhibition at Paris Palais de la Découverte: our pictures

In the Illusions exhibition running from November 6, 2018 to August 25, 2019, the Palais de la Découverte focuses on the visual, sound and tactile phenomena tricking our brains. Magicians master them, artists work them, scientists analyze them and as for us, illusions take us to a second state.

Accessible to kids from 7 years old, this exhibition will drive you crazy but also explain you why it’s normal. We all know an illusion, such as the Rubin Vase, this drawing in which some people may see two faces facing each other while others see a glass, or the Kanizsa Figures, these three broken rounds letting you see an imaginary triangle.

These illusions will be displayed through a tour according to the way the brain process information. An illusion will force the brain to fill a “wrong” piece of information conveyed by the senses (it has to fill the void, interpret a feeling) according to the mechanisms of the brain analyses. The Palais de la Découverte presents 4 mechanisms: interpreting brain, selective brain, sensitive brain, expert brain.

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• Interpreting brain: it’s the moment when the brain is tricked by its “data bank”. If the information is partial, the brain contextualizes to correct the holes and gets duped from time to time.
  
  
• Selective brain: it’s the situation when the brain gets several interpretations from the same source and has to pick up one. When a picture has 2 readings possible, the brain has to focus on one way to read it or it has to go from one way to the other without knowing which information is the most important.
  
  
  
  
• Sensitive brain: it questions the brain reference sources. When the senses receive information coming from the body, the brain focuses on the most vital information. From time to time, a red will be seen darker in a combination with a bright yellow compared with the same red on dark blue.
  
  
• Expert brain: it’s a problem when the brain doesn’t distinctly perceive the features of a face because it’s influenced by the general shape of the head and the context of the picture.

To understand the phenomena presented through this exhibition even better, the Palais de la Découverte offers a unique display seen from a biological or physical point of view. It brings a new scientific enlightenment to improve the notions approached in this exhibition.

Please note that it's been over 4 years since our last visit, so the place and experience may have changed.