Featured in these images is work from the Illuminating the Self exhibition, which is the culmination of a three-year collaboration with the Newcastle University-led CANDO research project. This is work from just one of many projects; the other projects can be seen on my website. The project has had extensive support from the Wellcome Trust Public Engagement Fund. At Newcastle University there is a long history of fruitful collaborations between artists and scientists. The exhibition shows the strong lines of connection between two fields often assumed to be polar opposites. Themes within the exhibition include the human perspective of living with epilepsy and the neurological processes happening within the brain. The work also explores ideas around Optogenetics, the technology being used by the CANDO project to prevent seizures, and how external manipulation of the brain might alter our sense of self. Blue Matter, immerses the visitor in an imagined landscape of the brain. Visual metaphors are created through a combination of drawing and computer animation. Silhouettes of the brain emerge as beautiful and powerful yet at the same time mysterious and enigmatic. Tree-like forms move and shift mesmerically; jagged lines intermittently cut across them like activity in the brain disrupted by a ‘seizure’. The fragile and delicate forms suggest an idyllic landscape – the brain as the Garden of Eden – perfect and untouched.