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IN THIS ISSUE
Fractal Art: Math in Art or Art in Math?
Archive:
From August 2007 -
When Marcom and Trademark Law Collide
SciFaiku: The Zen of Poetry About Science
Coming Soon
Intellectual Property Rights to Fictional Characters: The Dos and Don'ts of Fan Fiction
More Legal Gray Areas: Research and Patents
And a subscription form for free Intersections Newsletter updates!
A Gallery of Links and Useful Information
Fractal Art: Math in Art or Art in Math?
Imagine flying in a plane at 10,000 feet and seeing a shape in a
field below you. You zoom down quickly to 1,000 feet (ok, you
have some personal issues too), and you see that the
shape is the same or similar at this view as it was at 10,000 feet.
At 100 feet, it’s the same as it was at 1,000 or 10,000 feet.
At 10 feet, the shape’s still the same. What you’re observing is a
fractal, a shape subdivided into smaller and smaller geometric
shapes, each a smaller perfect (or almost perfect) copy of that larger shape.
Having trouble picturing this? Consider a
very simple fractal, this triangle, made from
a series of smaller triangles. However, fractals are typically too irregular to be broken
down into easily definable Euclidean shapes (e.g., triangles, circles, squares, rectangles) as can be seen from the image below.
A tutorial on fractals, co-authored by Benoit Mandelbrot.
Fractals in comics, architecture, and art.
Fractals in bacterial growth.
Was Johnathan Swift contemplating fractals as early as 1733? This verse might make you think so:
So Nat'ralists observe, a Flea
Hath smaller Fleas that on him prey,
And these have smaller fleas to bit em,
And so proceed ad infinitum...
from On Poetry: A Rhapsody.
Some have also said that Jackson Pollock's works represent examples of fractal art.
For more fractal art by CALLOOH, enter the gallery.
It's a Fractal World
Not just abstractions, the irregular but repeating forms of fractals can also be found in nature. Fractals can be observed just by looking at clouds, mountains, lightning, snowflakes, and shorelines.
And fractal-like shapes can even be found in the human body, for example, in the bronchi of the lungs and in the retina of the eye.
Want to learn how to create your own fractals? Read on.