What creates a genius? Is it simply a function of having the right brain patterns when the brain responds to trauma the syndrome refers to the new skills or abilities that emerge in a previously “normal” person, these new abilities follow brain injury, stroke, or other central nervous system incidents, and even dementia although it’s rare, like drawing and painting, post-accident. Other common savant skills include calendar day calculations, Math, Art, and Music.
Jim Carollo
When Jim Carollo was 14-years-old, His mother was killed in the crash, and Jim lapsed into a coma. Before the accident, Carollo had had no interest in Math; afterward, it came as easily as breathing. Without studying, he aced his high school geometry Mastery test. Memorizing any number was as simple as looking at it. He memorized 200 digits of pi in a little over a day.
Orlando Serrell
Orlando Serrell has become the poster boy for acquired savant syndrome. While playing as a boy in 1979, a baseball whacked him on the head. Serrell hit the ground, stunned, and then got up to keep playing ball. Besides eidetic memory of the past, the errant baseball had also struck Serrell with the ability to know the future. He’d become a calendar calculator–for any given date, Serrell could instantly calculate the day of the week.
Heather Thompson
In March 2011, Heather Thompson was hit on the head by the rear hatch of her SUV while she was loading groceries. The impact knocked her to the ground and gave her what the doctor’s called “a mild traumatic brain injury.” Then, a neighbour brought paintbrushes and suggested she try painting to help her relax. Thompson scoffed at the idea, but gave it a shot…and never stopped. The impact to her head seemed to have jogged her into a completely new personality.
Franco Magnani
In the 1960s, an Italian immigrant living in San Francisco began suffering from a strange and sudden illness. Franco Magnani was wracked by fevers that forced him into bed and brought on a state of delirium. While he suffered, he dreamed. He dreamed of his childhood home in Pontito, Italy, which he’d left almost a decade earlier. When he woke up as it turned out, Magnani was painting perfect, photorealistic snapshots of the village where he grew up, memories which his brain had stored away for years.
Jon Sarkin
Jon Sarkin was a normal man in a normal world. He played golf and kept up with the stock market. Then, one day, he almost died. Whatever he started as a series of surreal dreams soon transformed into a compulsion to paint. Sarkin quit his job and took up art full time, splitting his attention between painting and sculpting. It wasn’t long before his art–and his story–gained widespread media attention.
