Gaetano Kanizsa was an Italian psychologist

Psychology

Psychology is the study of the mind and behavior. Its immediate goal is to understand individuals and groups by both establishing general principles and researching specific cases. For many, the ultimate goal of psychology is to benefit society...

 and artist, founder of the Institute of Psychology of Trieste.

Born to a Hungarian

Hungary

Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...

 father and a Slovene mother, he attended the classic lyceum

Liceo classico

Liceo classico is a secondary school type in Italy. The educational curriculum lasts five years, and students are generally about 14 to 19 years of age....

, and got the laurea

Laurea

In Italy, the laurea is the main post-secondary academic degree.-Reforms due to the Bologna process:Spurred by the Bologna process, a major reform was instituted in 1999 to introduce easier university degrees comparable to the bachelors...

 (post-secondary academic degree) at the University of Padova in 1938, writing a thesis about eidetic memory

Eidetic memory

Eidetic , commonly referred to as photographic memory, is a medical term, popularly defined as the ability to recall images, sounds, or objects in memory with extreme precision and in abundant volume. The word eidetic, referring to extraordinarily detailed and vivid recall not limited to, but...

. In 1947 he became a teaching assistant in the University of Florence. In 1953 he returned to Trieste with the role of full professor, which he held for 30 years. He retired from academic life in 1988 and continued research until 1993, the year of his death.

A dominant figure in Italian psychology, Kanizsa became famous in the 70s, after having published an article about illusory contours

Illusory contours

Illusory contours or subjective contours are a form of visual illusion where contours are perceived without a luminance or color change across the contour. Friedrich Schumann discovered illusory contours.-Examples:...

 (Scientific American

Scientific American

Scientific American is a popular science magazine. It is notable for its long history of presenting science monthly to an educated but not necessarily scientific public, through its careful attention to the clarity of its text as well as the quality of its specially commissioned color graphics...

, 1976) and the book Organization in Vision (1979). A figure in which three illusory contours form a triangle is known as a Kanizsa triangle.

To his scientific interest, Kanizsa added his painting activity.

External links

• Some of Kanizsa's paintings on http://www.psico.univ.trieste.it/kanizsa/catalogo/catalogo.php3