Rubin vase in the context of Perceive

Perception (from Latin perceptio 'gathering, receiving') is the organization, identification, and interpretation of sensory information, in order to represent and understand the presented information or environment. All perception involves signals that go through the nervous system, which in turn result from physical or chemical stimulation of the sensory system. Vision involves light striking the retina of the eye; smell is mediated by odor molecules; and hearing involves pressure waves.

Perception is not only the passive receipt of these signals, but it is also shaped by the recipient's learning, memory, expectation, and attention. Sensory input is a process that transforms this low-level information to higher-level information (e.g., extracts shapes for object recognition). The following process connects a person's concepts and expectations (or knowledge) with restorative and selective mechanisms, such as attention, that influence perception.

Figure–ground organization is a type of perceptual grouping that is a vital necessity for recognizing objects through vision. In Gestalt psychology it is known as identifying a figure from the background. For example, black words on a printed paper are seen as the "figure", and the white sheet as the "background".

Ambiguous images or reversible figures are visual forms that create ambiguity by exploiting graphical similarities and other properties of visual system interpretation between two or more distinct image forms. These are famous for inducing the phenomenon of multistable perception. Multistable perception is the occurrence of an image being able to provide multiple, although stable, perceptions.

One of the earliest examples of this type is the rabbit–duck illusion, first published in Fliegende Blätter, a German humor magazine. Other classic examples are the Rubin vase, and the "My Wife and My Mother-in-Law" drawing, the latter dating from a German postcard of 1888.

Edgar John Rubin (September 6, 1886 – May 3, 1951) was a Danish psychologist/phenomenologist, remembered for his work on figure-ground perception as seen in such optical illusions like the Rubin vase.

Born to Jewish parents, Rubin was born and raised in Copenhagen. Enrolling at the University of Copenhagen in 1904, he majored in psychology and finished his magister artium examination in philosophy in 1910.

In art and design, negative space or negative volume is the empty space around and between the subject(s) of an image. In graphic design this is known as white space. Negative space may be most evident when the space around a subject, not the subject itself, forms an interesting or artistically relevant shape, and such space occasionally is used to artistic effect as the "real" subject of an image.