Producing and interpreting functional brain data is part of the negotiation we imagine our brain. To take a closer look at the idea of brain imaging as a form of visual knowledge, it is necessary to put the research of today into a historical context. In my article I will point to a specific approach of functional imaging which depends on historical shifts entangled with the visual aspect of producing pictures of the brain. I will bring out the interaction of issues like techniques, models and historical assumptions of the brain and link them with the way the brain images are presented. The aesthetic dimensions (Rancière) in the pictures are also questions of ethics and normativity.