ABSTRACT
“Synaesthesia” is the term used to describe a physiological diagnosis and certain practices of perception, as well as art programs which make use of such practices. This chapter proceeds from the observation that a remarkable number of physiologically caused synaesthesias are tied to the perception of coded signs and therefore investigates the sign-status of the perceived objects which trigger synaesthetic sensations. A semiotic classification of synaesthesias into stimulus-based, signifier-based, signified-based, and referent-based synaesthesias is proposed. In addition, the chapter elaborates on the distinction between constitutional synaesthesia and synaesthesia conceived as a process of reception in art: in a constitutional synaesthete, a perception involuntarily triggers a real sensation in one or more additional modalities of perception; in a synaesthetic art recipient, an aesthetic perception only evokes an idea of such a sensation. Synaesthetic art reception thus transpires as an intellectualized parallel of a physiological process. It is shown that the intellectualization of perception has steadily increased in modern times, and argued that this is due to overspecialized practices of perception.
