Math in Fine Arts
3D street art (Leon Keer)
Leon Keer learned to paint by designing and producing large advertisements for multinationals such as Coca-Cola. He has painted in a lot of countries: Europe, The United States, The United Arabic Emirates and Australia and several other Asian countries. He learned about the materials and techniques by practicing.
In his work, he often shows a message. Leon Keer always uses the technique with a one viewing-point. He calculates the angle and from that viewing-point it's 3D. From other viewing-points it's not clear. Leon Keer uses his creations as a metaphor for live. Leon Keer works with diffirent materials. His paintings mostly seemed to be scenes from videoclips. Leon Keer exhibited some of his paintings in Dutch and some British Art Galleries. His works are also exhibited in some Art shows in Europe and the USA. Street Art During his career Leon Keer also presents some live art works, while he was making the 3D painting the spectators could watch him. Most of his paintings are temporary but the creations are showed via social media all over the world. He said: 'Every street art piece is unique and belongs to the street and its residents, the temporary fact about this artform strengthens its existence’. |
Illusions in art
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This art work is made by M. C. Escher. It is a kind of illusion, because you see that at the top there are black birds with a white background and at the bottom you see that there are grey/white fishes with a black background. It are the mathematical proportions who make the fishes and birds fit exactly into each other. And it fits because of the measurements as well. The contrasting colours, black and white, have been chosen on purpose to give it more effect and you really see that it is the opposite of each other.
This art work you can make in various ways. You can draw it with a pair of compasses. But you can also make it on a designing site. Both ways have something to do with mathematics. The precise measurements make sure the circles overlap perfectly with each other. Some circles look like flowers, this is because of the overlapping. It is a simple but creative painting. When you use different colours it will look even more artistic. This art work is made with a designing programme on the computer. Designs like this could be made by everyone who downloads a computer program for designing things like this. It looks really great, because of all the coloured curves. It is not easy to create something like this, because you need to have all the correct measurements, of course, but it is very hard with the curves and many lines in between the curves. |
Leonardo da Vinci
By using math, you can create realistic proportion in e.g. human bodies. Because you use the proportions of the head, you can create a realistic human body. By putting the head seven times in the body, you can create a human body, with good proportions and a realistic look. Using proportions in the human body, and mathematics, people create human bodies.
Leonardo da Vinci, drew human bodies using a circle and a square. The square is used for the length of the human. The circle is used to make the length of the arms and legs, when the body differs in action and other positions. In this way, da Vinci used math to create realistic figures of people. |
Interview artist
We interviewed an artist to ask her in what way she used mathematics in her paintings.
How do you use mathematics in your paintings? - I use mathematics to enlarge pictures on the canvas, I divide the picture in squares and enlarge them. How big do you make the squares on the printed picture? - On the printed picture I draw squares of 1cm x 1cm. How do you know how big the squares on the canvas have to be? - Divide the length of the canvas by the length of the picture, for example the canvas is 50cm and the picture 12.5 cm. The squares need to be 4cm x 4cm because 50 : 12.5 = 4. Do you think this is a handy way to enlarge pictures easy? - I only use this technique with squared pictures, but I think it is an easy way to enlarge pictures. On the canvas, how do you draw the squares because you don’t want to see the lines in the end. - I use charcoal to draw the lines, but I don’t push too hard. |
Origami VideoTwo of our group members folded a frog, using the origami technique. On the right hand side a video with the steps :) .
By the way, if you want to try it yourself, don't use tape, it was in the video, but it was just to keep the paper in place. Have fun! |
Conclusion
What is the relation between fine arts and mathematics?
We have come to the conclusion that almost everything that has to do with fine arts, has a certain relation with mathematics. This is not what we expected to find out, but this made the project more interesting. In our project we have mentioned different kinds of fine arts which all have a relation to maths. For example with creating realistic human proportions in a drawing.
Recommendation;
We have discovered that you cannot become an artist but you need to have certain knowledge about maths or at least have some experience with it before being able to make fine arts.
We have come to the conclusion that almost everything that has to do with fine arts, has a certain relation with mathematics. This is not what we expected to find out, but this made the project more interesting. In our project we have mentioned different kinds of fine arts which all have a relation to maths. For example with creating realistic human proportions in a drawing.
Recommendation;
We have discovered that you cannot become an artist but you need to have certain knowledge about maths or at least have some experience with it before being able to make fine arts.
Comparison
We think that all the groups that have approached the topic fine arts in maths in a different way all the groups mentioned different kinds of aspects considering the subject.
In short our resluts:
- making a drawing look three dimensional
- creating an optical illusion
- drawing realistic human proportions
- making origami fugures
- how to enlarge pictures
In short their results:
Pawar public school;
- in paintings
- in dance
- in music
Hasanat;
- they showed 2D en 3D shapes
Similarities:
We think that there is one clear similarity between the groups: every group has mentioned that they didn't expect that there would be so much involvement of maths in fine arts and that it would play such a big role in those art pieces.
Differences:
We think there are a lot of differences between the groups especially in the way the groups approached the topic and which subjects were mentioned. One group only mentioned 2D en 3D shapes and explained them (= Hasanat school). The other group talked about fine arts in paintings, dance and music (= Pawar public school). In our group we looked at how maths is used in the process of making fine arts.
In short our resluts:
- making a drawing look three dimensional
- creating an optical illusion
- drawing realistic human proportions
- making origami fugures
- how to enlarge pictures
In short their results:
Pawar public school;
- in paintings
- in dance
- in music
Hasanat;
- they showed 2D en 3D shapes
Similarities:
We think that there is one clear similarity between the groups: every group has mentioned that they didn't expect that there would be so much involvement of maths in fine arts and that it would play such a big role in those art pieces.
Differences:
We think there are a lot of differences between the groups especially in the way the groups approached the topic and which subjects were mentioned. One group only mentioned 2D en 3D shapes and explained them (= Hasanat school). The other group talked about fine arts in paintings, dance and music (= Pawar public school). In our group we looked at how maths is used in the process of making fine arts.
Reflection
We think that we had a very good co-operation and that it almost couldn't have gone better. We all really liked the project because it is a very creative way of learning about a subject like maths. A negative aspect was that there was promised a video conference with India which never took place, so maybe for the next time plan it well or don't promise it.