April 14, 2019 Week 2: Math and Art

April 14, 2019

Week 2: Math and Art

Artistic representation of a six-dimensional space

           Mathematics and art have been intertwined for centuries. There has always been this aggressive push towards the more imaginative, which ultimately inspires the collaboration between the two disciplines. In Edwin Abbott's Flatland, we can see that even the simplest of realms seek more creativity in life. The emergence of artists learning from mathematicians and vice versa can be traced back to the discovery of the zero. This was a "paradigm shift," as Professor Vesna calls it, into a new world of creativity and realism.

           I never quite noticed how much artists needed to understand the rules of math until this week's lecture. Professor Vesna discusses the golden ratio, a concept that was first pioneered by the Egyptians in their Pyramids of Giza and was paramount to the use of geometry in art. In mathematics, "two quantities are in the golden ratio if their ratio is the same as the ratio of their sum to the larger of the two quantities." This idea was revolutionary to the creation of many famous pieces, such as The Last Supper (1494 - 1499) by Leonardo Da Vinci and Botticelli's The Birth of Venus (1483 - 1485). It was not until artists started using these techniques that artworks gained this sense of realism. This was the beginning of the shift from what Da Vinci calls an "artificial perspective" to a more natural one. We started to see the use of three-dimensional figures in a two-dimensional plane. As a result, artists like Cubists or Futurists continue to try and push the boundaries by simulating the use of a "four dimensional perspective" as Linda Henderson terms it. 

Botticelli's The Birth of Venus (1483 - 1485)

           These ideas have transcended their way into contemporary works. In M.C. Escher's wood engraving Stars (1948), he utilizes Brunelleschi's idea of the "vanishing point" to really capture a certain perspective of the observer. The observer's eyes key into the center of the frame in which all the lines seemingly connect. 

Maurits Cornelis Escher's Stars (1948)

          This discussion really broadened my perspective of many of the other ways that art can be related to science and math. In the modern day, we see this juxtaposition in technology as computers are using extreme levels of math to calculate algorithms, and the art reflected by these processes comes to us in the way of graphic design, digital imaging, and the like. With the digital age, the connection between math, art, and science is the most clear it has ever been!

References

Vesna, Victoria. “Mathematics-pt1-ZeroPerspectiveGoldenMean.mov.” Cole UC online. Youtube, 9 April 2012. Web. 11 Oct. 2012. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMmq5B1LKDg&feature=player_embedded

Henderson, Linda Dalrymple. “The Fourth Dimension and Non-Euclidean Geometry in Modern Art: Conclusion.” Leonardo. 17.3 (1984): 205-210. Print.

Escher, MC. Stars. Photograph. 1948. http://www.mathacademy.com/pr/minitext/escher/big.asp?IMAGE=stars

Botticelli, Sandro. The Birth of Venus. Photograph. 1483-1485. http://www.italianrenaissance.org/botticelli-birth-of-venus/

Holster, Jacques. Six Dimensions. Photograph. 2011. https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/Computer-animation-and-the-fourth-dimension-A../abd87c55ba4148090ae9c80f71925993733dc20e/figure/1

Palmer, Lauren. “History of the Golden Ratio in Art.” Artnet News, 2 Oct. 2015, news.artnet.com/art-world/golden-ratio-in-art-328435.

“Of the Nature of Flatland.” Flatland: an Edition with Notes and Commentary, by Edwin Abbott Abbott et al., Cambridge University Press, 2010, pp. 2–4.

Meisner, Gary, et al. “Golden Ratio in Art Composition and Design.” The Golden Ratio: Phi, 1.618, 24 Sept. 2016, www.goldennumber.net/art-composition-design/.