Week 2 - Where Art and Math meet

Since I was young I used to only see math and art as being two very different area's of study that didn't cross over at all. In primary school in New Zealand 'Art' had the stereotype of being 'easy' and 'fun' completing activities like, painting, drawing and creating sculptures with clay. Grading was subjective and the more creative and 'out of the box' your work, often the better you did. Whereas, math was more challenging and accurate and we were often tested on our ability with either a correct or wrong answer. However, I have found after spending more time studying these two areas in more depth there are characteristics that cross over and have found to be much more similar than one would expect. 

Math and art in the brain

Mathematics has an influence on many areas of study but specifically art with skills like analysis of symmetry and having an eye for linear. This dates back centuries to 1490 where Leonardo da Vinci demonstrated the concept of 'proportion' used by a Roman architect of the first century of our era called Vitruvius. This image bought in concepts on mathematics into his art by measuring the length of the open arms of a man to be equal to his height. Da Vinci also added a noteworthy composition adding to the structure of the drawing by adding a circle and a square around the man. 

I was able to learn concepts from the Sonia Sheridan's reading "Generative Systems” about genetics, diffraction, and time along with our lecture in week 2 where we discussed idea's like the 'golden ratio'. This a real irrational algebra constant which has the approximate value of 1.618 - which is represented by the  Greek letter φ. It is incredibly appealing as it is a pattern that is seen to repeat itself in nature. This was and is still being used to design projects including the famous Mona Lisa painting and face area. With the neck and head being in proportion showing symmetry and equal ratio making the painting incredibly appealing to the eye. 

The more you learn about art the further you understand the technical side and the background that goes into a lot of famous art work without even realising. In my first blog I mentioned the connection between science and art which is also intertwined with math and art. Mathematics and science are also heavily related mainly through the sound of magnetic waves. This shows the recognition of patterns specifically the sine wave showing a repeating pattern of amplitudes.

According to dictionary.com juxtaposition has the deffiniton to 'place close together or side by side, especially for comparison or contrast'. This correlates to art, science and math which might all seem to be separate area's of study but after finding through examples my blogs they are similar and use area's of both. 

Olivia Hay

Sources: 

"Leonardo da Vinci, Vitruvius Man, 1490, Gallerie dell’Accademia" https://www.desenhoonline.com/site/wp-content/uploads/Homem-Vitruviano-Leonardo-da-Vinci.jpg 

"Fibonacci Sequence in Leonardo da Vinci’s, Mona Lisa, 1503, Louvre Museum. Pinterest" Fibonacci Sequence in Leonardo da Vinci’s, Mona Lisa, 1503, Louvre Museum. Pinterest 

""Juxtaposition." https://www.dictionary.com/browse/juxtapose. 8th April 2021

"Sine waves example" https://www.allaboutcircuits.com/video-tutorials/characteristics-of-sinusoidal-signals/ . 8th April 2021

https://www.dailyartmagazine.com/art-and-math/ 

"Math and art in the brain" https://www.pbs.org/parents/thrive/picture-this-using-art-to-explore-math-and-math-to-create-art

Desma 9 lecture video

Jessica. "Student Series! How the Parthenon Embodies Math & Science." Student Series! How the Parthenon Embodies Math & Science. 28 Sept. 2019. Web. 08 Apr. 2021.

https://www.mathsisfun.com/numbers/golden-ratio.html