Mike Naylor
My artwork focuses on creating geometric forms using human figures. The blending of human bodies and mathematical shapes can create a surprising and sometimes surreal effect that makes us feel physically connected to something powerful and important. Mathematics is part of us, and we are part of mathematics.
The second iteration of the Sierpinski Triangle, made from gymnasts. These acrobats were created using Poser and Photoshop, but the physics is sound and a tower such as this could stand.
This work was created in tribute to the late Benoit Mandelbrot.
Human lives and relationships are strange and complex things, and the Mandelbrot set seems to capture the essence of strangeness and complexity as few mathematical forms can. "The Human Web" juxtaposes a web of human figures with the Mandelbrot set in order to symbolize the complexity and beauty of our human relationships.
The underlying Mandelbrot image was created with Xaos, the human figures created with Poser and arranged into a web using Photoshop. This web was then transformed using MathMap and GIMP, and the various layers were reassembled in Photoshop.
A pentagram is a five-pointed star. When inscribed inside of a pentagon, it becomes a symbol that was of importance to the ancient Pythagoreans. The inscribed pentagram embodies the golden ratio in many ways and was used in part to identify members of the Pythagorean school.
The inscribed pentagram is also the shape of the K5 graph, a complete set of 5 vertices all connected to one another.
Here the graph is represented by a group of 5 men, with their legs forming the pentagon, their arms forming the pentagram, and their heads doubtless lost in mystical contemplation of all that is good and beautiful.