Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Mathematics: user's manual
- Appetizers
- 1 Space and geometry
- 2 Motions on the plane
- 3 The many symmetries of planar objects
- 4 The many objects with planar symmetries
- 5 Reflections on the mirror
- 6 A raw material
- 7 Stretching the plane
- 8 Aural wallpaper
- 9 The dawn of perspective
- 10 A repertoire of drawing systems
- 11 The vicissitudes of perspective
- 12 The vicissitudes of geometry
- 13 Symmetries in non-Euclidean geometries
- 14 The shape of the universe
- Appendix: Rule-driven creation
- References
- Acknowledgements
- Index of symbols
- Index of names
- Index of concepts
10 - A repertoire of drawing systems
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 May 2013
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Mathematics: user's manual
- Appetizers
- 1 Space and geometry
- 2 Motions on the plane
- 3 The many symmetries of planar objects
- 4 The many objects with planar symmetries
- 5 Reflections on the mirror
- 6 A raw material
- 7 Stretching the plane
- 8 Aural wallpaper
- 9 The dawn of perspective
- 10 A repertoire of drawing systems
- 11 The vicissitudes of perspective
- 12 The vicissitudes of geometry
- 13 Symmetries in non-Euclidean geometries
- 14 The shape of the universe
- Appendix: Rule-driven creation
- References
- Acknowledgements
- Index of symbols
- Index of names
- Index of concepts
Summary
On those remote pages it is written that animals are divided into (a) those that belong to the Emperor, (b) embalmed ones, (c) those that are trained, (d) suckling pigs, (e) mermaids, (f) fabulous ones, (g) stray dogs, (h) those that are included in this classification, (i) those that tremble as if they were mad, (j) innumerable ones, (k) those drawn with a very fine camel's hair brush, (l) others, (m) those that have just broken a flower vase, (n) those that resemble flies from a distance.
J.L. Borges (1964: The analytical language of John Wilkins)The artist drawing a scene faces the choice of a number of possibilities regarding vantage point and position of the picture plane. These choices naturally determine the way the artist sees the scene; for instance, whether a subject is portrayed frontwards, or side face, or somehow in between. It is apparent that the number of substantially different choices for our artist depends on, and increases with the complexity of, the scene. Since the nature of this scene is not necessarily amenable to mathematical terms, the idea of a catalogue of such choices akin to the catalogues we described in Section 3.8 is out of place. But there are a number of choices having a mathematical character which can be considered independently of the depicted scene.
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- Manifold MirrorsThe Crossing Paths of the Arts and Mathematics, pp. 260 - 292Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2013