Francoise Beck-Pieterhons
Free-lance writer and Italianist, I express in animal painting my immense love and respect for our so-called 'inferior' friends. In a math-art community, why not try to capture participants' interest to aspects of animality close to mathematics, through the emotional appeal of the painting medium?
This Buccinum undatum sea snail, known as the common whelk, found along the North Atlantic shores and namely in Belgium, is an interesting and wonderful example of a 3D spiral, where an animal lives 'coiled' ('lové', in French).
It can be considered a reference to the symbolism from the old Egyptian thinking, where the spiral is life.
May I invite you, while observing the painting, to imagine the appeal of this spiral geometry to mathematicians, musicians, and even acousticians. The latter indeed are specially interested in the large cousin found in warm waters, the Charonia Tritonis sometimes called the Triton's Trumpet.