MesMath

M.C. Escher - Impossible Mathematical Art 

               Escher is a famous artist who created mathematically challenging artwork.  He used only simple drawing tools and the naked eye, but was able to create stunning mathematical pieces.  He focused on the division of the plane and played with impossible spaces.  He produced poly types, sometimes in drawings, which cannot be constructed in the real world, but can be described using mathematics.  His drawings caught the eyes and looked possible by perception, but were mathematically impossible.

                                 Escher also created many interlocking figures that seemed mathematically incorrect.  By using black and white, he was able to create different dimensions to make the mathematically impossible seem possible.  Escher often combined two and three dimensional images into a single print, like his piece entitled Reptiles, where the reptiles themselves come out of a tessellation and walk around and then go back into the two dimensional picture.  

                                                        M C Escher drew many enthralling landscapes, portraits, and geometric designs, "Tessellations," however, for which he is most famous, were his main preoccupation. Recognized for his pragmatic, meticulous prints that accomplish ocular and abstract effects, Escher shaped thousands of 'Tessellating' shapes in the form of fish, birds, dogs, crabs, insects, horses, humans, and other beasts. Arithmetic and Crystallographic in style, M.C. Escher's works integrated Monet's vision, Michelangelo's judgment & meticulousness, the perception & the three-dimensional images of Wright, and the patterns of the Moors. His works fashioned an impractical world of eccentric and the wonderful 'Tessellations' of people, animals, and geometric shapes. M.C. Escher passed away on March 27, 1972, at an age of 73