Construct the Labyrinth from Which You Plan to Escape
… has been the motto of the Oulipo movement, French writers and mathematicians who have boosted their creative writing by imposing arbitrary constraints.
I had practiced Oulipo long before I knew the term. I just called it Search Term Poetry or Spam Poetry. I have been picking unedited snippets from text, presented by search engines mostly.
Creativity flows like a river, constrained by topography and guided by gravitation.
Subconsciously, I have applied the same concept to my visual art. You can create literally anything today, with digital tools. So, I set up my topography and my guidelines.
It has to be based on physics. Not just loosely inspired by physics (in the way the typical nonsensical blackboard with “world formulas” looks like in movies). When I depict a magnetic field, I do the numerical calculations to get it right.
Working traditionally – on paper – I have to follow through once I started laying out the first shapes on the paper. Not being able to undo is a blessing. You have to build on your existing work gradually and slowly.
Creating a series adds another dimension of constraints: All drawings in a series need to hang together somehow.
With Poinsot’s Paper Spaceship, my goal has been to explore the physics of the force-free gyroscope, using the geometrical approach of French mathematician Louis Poinsot.
The constraints were:
~ Draw the intersection of an ellipsoid and a sphere exactly – dictated by physics.
~ Use traditional descriptive geometry and axonometric projection – my choice for most of my “3D” geometric drawings.
~ Use three straight-on views (even though only two are needed for the construction) as a basis for the orthographic projection.
~ Use the lines needed in the construction to create a natural tessellation of the surface and color the areas in the style of stained glass.
~ Create a series of four, each drawing featuring a differently shaped ellipsoid, and using different color schemes.
This is the result:
Poinsot’s Paper Spaceship: UFO – Zeppelin – Bumblebee – Evil
How to present the series? I am a fan of art that is “free standing”, double-sided, and also functional.
So, I designed coffee mugs that are printed with two of these images, respectively.
Here are photos of the mug combining “UFO” and “Evil”!
In case you need a gift for a science / math / physics / geometry enthusiast: You can buy all four mugs in my new store:
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