Geometry & Art: How Mathematics Transformed Art During the Renaissance

A definitive look at how geometry changed the world of art forever.

Geometry & Art follows the artists of the Renaissance, whose search for perspective and visual depth led them to the study of geometry. Influencing the work of artists such as Paulo Uccello, Piero della Francesco, and Leonardo Da Vinci, this breakthrough quickly spread to Germany, where a passion for polyhedral-based geometrical designs flourished as a distinct new art in the mid-16th century.

A period of enormous political and cultural change, the Renaissance empowered artists to draw upon a blossoming revival of classical art, philosophy, and culture. At the same time, a wealth of new ideas and concepts were flowing into Europe from the Islamic Middle East. And it was this flood of revolutionary new thought that would lead to the syntheses of mathematics, geometry, and art that characterizes the painting, sculpture and visual language of the Renaissance.

This authoritative volume uses engaging text, compelling historical accounts, and 250 beautiful illustrations to immerse readers in the fundamental Renaissance forms which, although conceived over five-hundred years ago, still have the capacity to awe and inspire us with their beauty.
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Geometry & Art: How Mathematics Transformed Art During the Renaissance

A definitive look at how geometry changed the world of art forever.

Geometry & Art follows the artists of the Renaissance, whose search for perspective and visual depth led them to the study of geometry. Influencing the work of artists such as Paulo Uccello, Piero della Francesco, and Leonardo Da Vinci, this breakthrough quickly spread to Germany, where a passion for polyhedral-based geometrical designs flourished as a distinct new art in the mid-16th century.

A period of enormous political and cultural change, the Renaissance empowered artists to draw upon a blossoming revival of classical art, philosophy, and culture. At the same time, a wealth of new ideas and concepts were flowing into Europe from the Islamic Middle East. And it was this flood of revolutionary new thought that would lead to the syntheses of mathematics, geometry, and art that characterizes the painting, sculpture and visual language of the Renaissance.

This authoritative volume uses engaging text, compelling historical accounts, and 250 beautiful illustrations to immerse readers in the fundamental Renaissance forms which, although conceived over five-hundred years ago, still have the capacity to awe and inspire us with their beauty.
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Geometry & Art: How Mathematics Transformed Art During the Renaissance

Geometry & Art: How Mathematics Transformed Art During the Renaissance

by David Wade
Geometry & Art: How Mathematics Transformed Art During the Renaissance

Geometry & Art: How Mathematics Transformed Art During the Renaissance

by David Wade

Hardcover(Illustrated)

$24.95 
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Overview


A definitive look at how geometry changed the world of art forever.

Geometry & Art follows the artists of the Renaissance, whose search for perspective and visual depth led them to the study of geometry. Influencing the work of artists such as Paulo Uccello, Piero della Francesco, and Leonardo Da Vinci, this breakthrough quickly spread to Germany, where a passion for polyhedral-based geometrical designs flourished as a distinct new art in the mid-16th century.

A period of enormous political and cultural change, the Renaissance empowered artists to draw upon a blossoming revival of classical art, philosophy, and culture. At the same time, a wealth of new ideas and concepts were flowing into Europe from the Islamic Middle East. And it was this flood of revolutionary new thought that would lead to the syntheses of mathematics, geometry, and art that characterizes the painting, sculpture and visual language of the Renaissance.

This authoritative volume uses engaging text, compelling historical accounts, and 250 beautiful illustrations to immerse readers in the fundamental Renaissance forms which, although conceived over five-hundred years ago, still have the capacity to awe and inspire us with their beauty.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781627951050
Publisher: Shelter Harbor Press
Publication date: 03/07/2018
Edition description: Illustrated
Pages: 224
Sales rank: 414,064
Product dimensions: 8.60(w) x 10.00(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

David Wade is a sculptor, photographer, and author who has written extensively on the intersection of geometry, art, and design.

Table of Contents

Author's Note 6

The Divine Beauty of Geometry 9

The Classical Origins of a Compelling Idea 10

The Platonic Continuum in the Later Classical World 14

The Byzantine & Islamic Tenures of Classical Greek Knowledge 17

Loss & Partial Recovery 22

The Early Translators 24

Neoplatonismas an Influence on Medieval European Art 26

Neoplatonism as an Influence on Islamic Art 28

The Revival of the Latin West 35

Florence in the Ouattrocentro 36

Measuring the World: Renaissance Cosmography 41

Florence & the Invention of Perspective 46

New Ways of Seeing: Lenses & the Camera Obscura 50

The Geometrical Cosmos 52

Piero Della Francesca 61

Paulo Uccello 65

Geometry, Proportion & Istoria in the Quattrocentro 68

Luca Pacioli 74

De Divina Proportione 76

Leonardo & Geometry 78

Harmonic Proportion in the Human Figure 84

Geometry & Proportion in the Shaping of Letters 88

Ideal Cities of the Renaissance 92

Andrea Palladia & Harmonic Proportions 98

Geometria & the Liberal Arts 102

Geometric Motifs in Italian Intarsia 104

Geometria & The Northern Renaissance 109

Mathematics, Geometry & Perspective North of the Alps 110

Albrecht Dürer: Artist, Humanist & Geometer 116

Dürer's & Leonardo's Knot Patterns 122

Geometrising the Human Figure 124

Nuremberg: Early-Modern Centre of Enterprise & Culture 126

Printing & Publishing in the Renaissance 128

Ratdolt's Euclid 131

Geometrical Treatises in Germany in the 1500s 133

The Popularisers: Rodler, Hirschvogel & Lautensack 136

Polyhedra & The Creative Imagination 139

The German Creative Geometricists 140

Wenzel Jamnitzer 142

Lorenz Stoer 150

Anon (c. 1565-1600): Geometrische und Perspectivische 158

Johannes Lenker 162

Letters & Perspective: Perspective, Literaria 166

The Dresden Kunstkammer 170

Later German Contributors 172

Paul Pfinzing 174

Peter Halt (fl.1629-1653) 180

Johannes Kepler: Celestial Mathematician 182

Geometric Motifs in German Intarsia 188

The Continuing Influence of Geometria 193

Later Geometric/Perspective Treatises in Italy 194

The Mazzocchio 200

Esoteric, Arcane & Occult Geometries 202

De Vries, Baroque & the Decline of Imaginative Geometricism 208

Geometry & Symmetry in Renaissance Garden Design 212

The Form & Structure of Crystals 216

In Conclusion 219

Geometric Treatises 220

Bibliography & Acknowledgements 221

Index 222

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