Mathematics and Art

Mathematics and Art

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. This book emphasizes and renews the deep relation between Mathematics and Art. The Forum Discussion suggests to develop a deeper interpenetration between these two cultural fields, notably in the teaching of both Mathematics and Art.

Mathematics and Art

Something Reckless

Something Reckless

Prim, headstrong, and beautiful Penelope is determined to expose the licentious affairs of the ton’s randiest rakes. Now one of their powerful numberthe unrepentant libertine Jeremy Vaughn, Duke of Kilgrathhas been selected to put an end to the prudish lady’s interference. Jeremy’s plan is devilishly clever: He will join Penelope’s war against immorality, fighting passionately by her side, all the while showering her with anonymous erotic missives designed to titillate even the coldest, most unwilling maid. He will break down her defenses and inflame her repressed desires by escorting her (in the interests of their ‘noble campaign’) to London’s most notorious pleasure palaces. And he will visit her boudoirmaskedduring the night to school her in the deliciously sinful arts she wishes to abolish. Then he will expose her hypocrisy to the world.

Something Reckless

Silence

Silence

Silence, John Cage’s first book and epic masterpiece, was published in October 1961. In these lectures, scores, and writings, Cage tries, as he says, to find a way of writing that comes from ideas, is not about them, but that produces them. Often these writings include mesostics and essays created by subjecting the work of other writers to chance procedures using the I Ching. Fifty years later comes a beautiful new edition with a foreword by eminent music critic Kyle Gann. A landmark book in American arts and culture, Silence has been translated into more than forty languages and has sold over half a million copies worldwide. Wesleyan University Press is proud to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the book’s publication with this special hardcover edition.

Silence

Medicine and Modernism

Medicine and Modernism

This is the first in-depth study of the English neurologist and polymath Sir Henry Head (1861-1940). Head bridged the gap between science and the arts. He was a published poet who had close links with such figures as Thomas Hardy and Siegfried Sassoon. His research into the nervous system and the relationship between language and the brain broke new ground. L S Jacyna argues that these advances must be contextualised within wider Modernist debates about perception and language. In his time, Head was best known for his research into the human nervous system, but also worked on the localization of the language function within the brain. Head radically revised current ideas about the physiological basis of language. As well as its impact on medicine and biology, this work was seen to have implications for other disciplines including linguistics and social anthropology. This important new study draws upon a wide range of previously unpublished resources.

Medicine and Modernism

Art, Culture and the Semiotics of Meaning

Art, Culture and the Semiotics of Meaning

Do the arts mean? Do all the arts mean? Do they all mean in the same way? Does an art work mean in the same way in which a street sign means? More importantly, do all art works mean in a semiotically interesting way? This book argues for the importance of those formal meanings in the arts which most effectively enrich our knowledge of ‘the way things are’ and train our cognitive faculties to deal with them. Jackson Barry examines the meaning of art works as read through their material and formal constituents using a semiotic approach which clarifies the historical and cultural forces molding these sensorially elaborated ‘signs.’ Medieval wheel-of-fortune diagrams, a Shakespeare play, non-objective painting, and a stage set for Tennessee Williams’ A Streetcar Named Desire, all demonstrate the interplay between concepts struggling for expression and the available matter and form for their manifestation. At the end, the author considers the biological basis for art as defined in contemporary cognitive science.

Art, Culture and the Semiotics of Meaning

Jubilee City

Jubilee City

Joe Andoe is an internationally exhibited painter. His work, hailed by The New Yorker as ‘cowboy noir with a fashionista twist,’ is in the collections of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, the Whitney Museum of Art in New York, and countless other locations. He is a father. He is a writer. He is sober. That’s now.

Jubilee City

Makers

Makers

Here is the first comprehensive survey of modern craft in the United States. Makersfollows the development of studio craft–objects in fiber, clay, glass, wood, and metal–from its roots in nineteenth-century reform movements to the rich diversity of expression at the end of the twentieth century. &9; More than four hundred illustrations complement this chronological exploration of the American craft tradition. Keeping as their main focus the objects and the makers, Janet Koplos and Bruce Metcalf offer a detailed analysis of seminal works and discussions of education, institutional support, and the philosophical underpinnings of craft. In a vivid and accessible narrative, they highlight the value of physical skill, examine craft as a force for moral reform, and consider the role of craft as an aesthetic alternative. Exploring craft’s relationship to fine arts and design, Koplos and Metcalf foster a critical understanding of the field and help explain craft’s place in contemporary culture. Makers will be an indispensable volume for craftspeople, curators, collectors, critics, historians, students, and anyone who is interested in American craft. &9; &9; Exploring craft’s relationship to fine arts and design, Koplos and Metcalf foster a critical understanding of the field and help explain craft’s place in contemporary culture. Makers will be an indispensable volume for craftspeople, curators, collectors, critics, historians, students, and anyone who is interested in American craft.

Makers

Encyclopedia of Judaism

Encyclopedia of Judaism

Encyclopedia of Judaism explores a religion that has a 2,000-year recorded history and has been a part of the culture of almost every country and society around the globe. Encapsulating all things Jewishlanguage, laws, literature, arts, theology, ritual, land, culture, and personalitiesthis authoritative volume offers readers access to Judaism from both a historical and contemporary perspective.

Encyclopedia of Judaism