synaesthesia

The experience of one sense as a result of the stimulation of a different sense; for example, an experience of colour may result from hearing a sound. Approximately 1 in 2,000 have the condition, and the majority are female. The commonest form of synaesthesia is experiencing words as colours. Some synaesthesics experience sounds as colours or shapes, and tastes as shapes. A 1995 UK study produced evidence that it is genetically controlled, possibly X-linked.

This experience is sometimes imitated in the arts. The French poet Charles Baudelaire used the phrase ‘scarlet fanfare’, while composers, such as Skriabin and Schoenberg, asked for colours to be projected to accompany their works, for example, Skriabin's Poem of Fire (1913). Other examples are Walt Disney's Fantasia (1940) and the psychedelic light show.