Mathematics and Art

Mathematics and Art
Author: Lynn Gamwell
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 576
Release: 2016
Genre: Art
ISBN: 0691165289

This is a cultural history of mathematics and art, from antiquity to the present. Mathematicians and artists have long been on a quest to understand the physical world they see before them and the abstract objects they know by thought alone. Taking readers on a tour of the practice of mathematics and the philosophical ideas that drive the discipline, Lynn Gamwell points out the important ways mathematical concepts have been expressed by artists. Sumptuous illustrations of artworks and cogent math diagrams are featured in Gamwell's comprehensive exploration. Gamwell begins by describing mathematics from antiquity to the Enlightenment, including Greek, Islamic, and Asian mathematics. Then focusing on modern culture, Gamwell traces mathematicians' search for the foundations of their science, such as David Hilbert's conception of mathematics as an arrangement of meaning-free signs, as well as artists' search for the essence of their craft, such as Aleksandr Rodchenko's monochrome paintings. She shows that self-reflection is inherent to the practice of both modern mathematics and art, and that this introspection points to a deep resonance between the two fields: Kurt Gödel posed questions about the nature of mathematics in the language of mathematics and Jasper Johns asked "What is art?" in the vocabulary of art. Throughout, Gamwell describes the personalities and cultural environments of a multitude of mathematicians and artists, from Gottlob Frege and Benoît Mandelbrot to Max Bill and Xu Bing. Mathematics and Art demonstrates how mathematical ideas are embodied in the visual arts and will enlighten all who are interested in the complex intellectual pursuits, personalities, and cultural settings that connect these vast disciplines.

The Geometry of an Art

The Geometry of an Art
Author: Kirsti Andersen
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 837
Release: 2008-11-23
Genre: Mathematics
ISBN: 0387489460

This review of literature on perspective constructions from the Renaissance through the 18th century covers 175 authors, emphasizing Peiro della Francesca, Guidobaldo del Monte, Simon Stevin, Brook Taylor, and Johann Heinrich. It treats such topics as the various methods of constructing perspective, the development of theories underlying the constructions, and the communication between mathematicians and artisans in these developments.

Math Art

Math Art
Author: Stephen Ornes
Publisher: Sterling New York
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2019
Genre: MATHEMATICS
ISBN: 9781454930440

The worlds of visual art and mathematics beautifully unite in this spectacular volume by award-winning writer Stephen Ornes. He explores the growing sensation of math art, presenting such pieces as a colorful crocheted representation of non-Euclidian geometry that looks like sea coral and a 65-ton, 28-foot-tall bronze sculpture covered in a space-filling curve. We learn the artist's story for every work, plus the mathematical concepts and equations behind the art.

Mathematics for the Liberal Arts

Mathematics for the Liberal Arts
Author: Jason I. Brown
Publisher: CRC Press
Total Pages: 441
Release: 2014-12-04
Genre: Mathematics
ISBN: 146659358X

This textbook teaches everyday mathematics topics to non-math majors at the undergraduate level. Through numerous examples and more than 600 exercises, students learn how to use math seamlessly in a variety of practical areas, from conversion factors, statistics, visualization, money, and risk to games, art, music, and humor. The text develops a logical, real-world approach to data and reasoning. Real-life stories in each chapter capture students' interest and motivate them to work through the math. Ancillaries are available on the author's website.

Galileo's Muse

Galileo's Muse
Author: Mark A. Peterson
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 347
Release: 2011-10-17
Genre: Art
ISBN: 0674059727

Mark Peterson makes an extraordinary claim in this fascinating book focused around the life and thought of Galileo: it was the mathematics of Renaissance arts, not Renaissance sciences, that became modern science. Galileo's Muse argues that painters, poets, musicians, and architects brought about a scientific revolution that eluded the philosopher-scientists of the day, steeped as they were in a medieval cosmos and its underlying philosophy. According to Peterson, the recovery of classical science owes much to the Renaissance artists who first turned to Greek sources for inspiration and instruction. Chapters devoted to their insights into mathematics, ranging from perspective in painting to tuning in music, are interspersed with chapters about Galileo's own life and work. Himself an artist turned scientist and an avid student of Hellenistic culture, Galileo pulled together the many threads of his artistic and classical education in designing unprecedented experiments to unlock the secrets of nature. In the last chapter, Peterson draws our attention to the Oratio de Mathematicae laudibus of 1627, delivered by one of Galileo's students. This document, Peterson argues, was penned in part by Galileo himself, as an expression of his understanding of the universality of mathematics in art and nature. It is "entirely Galilean in so many details that even if it is derivative, it must represent his thought," Peterson writes. An intellectual adventure, Galileo’s Muse offers surprising ideas that will capture the imagination of anyone—scientist, mathematician, history buff, lover of literature, or artist—who cares about the humanistic roots of modern science.

Pi (π) in Nature, Art, and Culture

Pi (π) in Nature, Art, and Culture
Author: Marcel Danesi
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 144
Release: 2020-12-07
Genre: Mathematics
ISBN: 9004433392

In Pi (π) in Nature, Art, and Culture Marcel Danesi investigates the manifestations of π in science, nature, symbolism, and culture, arguing that these are intrinsically intertwined.

Connections Between Mathematics, the Arts and Architecture

Connections Between Mathematics, the Arts and Architecture
Author: Nicoletta Sala
Publisher: Nova Science Publishers
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2019
Genre: Architecture
ISBN: 9781536151954

The purpose of this book is to analyze the interdisciplinary aspects of mathematics and geometry in reference to nature, art, and architecture.In Chapter 1, we introduce symmetry and its different meanings. Symmetry is a notion, which has been applied in the arts and architecture to find harmony and beauty. It joins aesthetics and practice, science and economy, mathematics and philosophy. In this chapter, we also analyze the influence of Vitruvius and the concept of old symmetry, received by the Renaissance. It is also interesting to note how in contemporary architecture there is often the presence of the "break" of symmetry (for example in the Frank O. Gehry's works).Chapter 2 explains how proportions, and in particular, the golden section, has introduced aesthetic canons that have strongly influenced many artists like Polycletus, and architects, from Ictinus to Le Corbusier.In Chapter 3, we discover how curves and spirals find their application in artistic works, for example in Mycenaean jewelry, and architectural works, from the Baroque of Francesco Borromini to the Land Art of Smithson.Chapter 4 presents the importance and influence that Platonic solids and polyhedrons have had on philosophy and art through different historical periods and different cultures. For instance, we look at how Platonic solids are connected to the theory of Empedocles' elements and Hippocrates' theory of humors.Chapter 5 describes surfaces, discovering how different cultures have used them in different manners, including Roman aqueducts, iron bridges, and finally arriving on modern structures that base their forms on hyperboloids and paraboloids.In Chapter 6, we introduce fractal geometry, as a geometry that tries to explain nature's irregular shapes, trying to overcome the limitations imposed by "old" Euclidean geometry. We also analyze how fractal geometry has influenced architecture in this century.

Mathematics and the Search for Knowledge

Mathematics and the Search for Knowledge
Author: Morris Kline
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Total Pages: 270
Release: 1985-07-18
Genre: Mathematics
ISBN: 0198020619

Requires a minimum of technical knowledge and gives an illuminating oversight of the historical developments...with many interesting observations along the way.--Proceedings of the Edinburgh Mathematical Society The lively writing makes this suitable supplementary reading for advanced undergraduates from many disciplines. An extensive and often technical bibliography is included for those who want to go further.

Lumen Naturae

Lumen Naturae
Author: Matilde Marcolli
Publisher: MIT Press
Total Pages: 390
Release: 2020-05-26
Genre: Mathematics
ISBN: 0262043904

Exploring common themes in modern art, mathematics, and science, including the concept of space, the notion of randomness, and the shape of the cosmos. This is a book about art—and a book about mathematics and physics. In Lumen Naturae (the title refers to a purely immanent, non-supernatural form of enlightenment), mathematical physicist Matilde Marcolli explores common themes in modern art and modern science—the concept of space, the notion of randomness, the shape of the cosmos, and other puzzles of the universe—while mapping convergences with the work of such artists as Paul Cezanne, Mark Rothko, Sol LeWitt, and Lee Krasner. Her account, focusing on questions she has investigated in her own scientific work, is illustrated by more than two hundred color images of artworks by modern and contemporary artists. Thus Marcolli finds in still life paintings broad and deep philosophical reflections on space and time, and connects notions of space in mathematics to works by Paul Klee, Salvador Dalí, and others. She considers the relation of entropy and art and how notions of entropy have been expressed by such artists as Hans Arp and Fernand Léger; and traces the evolution of randomness as a mode of artistic expression. She analyzes the relation between graphical illustration and scientific text, and offers her own watercolor-decorated mathematical notebooks. Throughout, she balances discussions of science with explorations of art, using one to inform the other. (She employs some formal notation, which can easily be skipped by general readers.) Marcolli is not simply explaining art to scientists and science to artists; she charts unexpected interdependencies that illuminate the universe.

Mathematics and Art

Mathematics and Art
Author: Claude P. Bruter
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 337
Release: 2013-04-17
Genre: Mathematics
ISBN: 3662049090

Recent progress in research, teaching and communication has arisen from the use of new tools in visualization. To be fruitful, visualization needs precision and beauty. This book is a source of mathematical illustrations by mathematicians as well as artists. It offers examples in many basic mathematical fields including polyhedra theory, group theory, solving polynomial equations, dynamical systems and differential topology. For a long time, arts, architecture, music and painting have been the source of new developments in mathematics. And vice versa, artists have often found new techniques, themes and inspiration within mathematics. Here, while mathematicians provide mathematical tools for the analysis of musical creations, the contributions from sculptors emphasize the role of mathematics in their work.