Introduction -- The creation of a new scientific persona : Santiago Ramón y Cajal and the rise of popular photography in Spain -- The curtain rises on the magic theater of life : Cajal, master of light and color -- Matter, time, and landscape : ways of seeing in Cajal, Ortega, and Benjamin -- Science as a two-way street : contradictory traces of modernity in Dalí and Terán -- Conclusion : a last look at observation