LinDESMA9: Desma9 assignment 2, Math and art

As a student of applied mathematics major, it is pretty fun for me to take this week’s lecture, which is about the relationship between math and art. In this week’s lecture, I learned that with the improvement of mathematics, artists make their paintings more realistic and beautiful. To be more specific, Brunelleschi discovered the rule of vanishing point in 1413 and attributed greatly to the development of art. And with the appearance of idea of perspective, painting was never simply of drawing and coloring but needed a step of proportion. Moreover, Golden ratio, which can be expressed by 1/x=x/1-x in formulation, was largely used in sculpture, architecture and painting. The famous artist and scientist as well, Da vinci, was a “fan” of the golden ratio.

Brunelleschi, famous Italian architect and engineer

Parthenon, one of ancient buildings in the world, is a perfect example of how mathematics can influence art and science. Parthenon was built in about 400.AD and I think the main reason it can still be complete after more than a thousand years is the structure in golden ratio. (The Roof was lost in the war between Turkish Empire and the ancient Greece, which is unavoidable.) The Golden ratio not only gives the building a strong structure but a wonderful outlook as well.

Parthenon in golden ration, 400.AD

For artist who uses mathematics in his art work, we should think of a person Da Vinci. His famous work, Mona Lisa, the women portrayed was also in golden ratio. Moreover, his work named Vitruvian man is a great example of combination of art, science and mathematics. The man’s position can be seen as a circle and it gave the idea that human proportion can be used in architecture as well. This is well used by the famous French architect, Le Corbusier.

Mona lisa, the most famous painting in the world

With all of the above, I’d like to say that the juxtaposition of math, art and science is that on one hand, without math, science and art cannot develop so rapidly and math should be seen as the base of art and science. On the other hand, without the desire to develop art and science, math will not develop as well and many great discoveries may never happen.