Dan Bach

3D math artist / interactive book author
dansmathshop
Oakland, California, USA

I'm Dan Bach (@dansmath on twitter), a former college mathematics teacher from California. I used Mathematica for over 20 years in the classroom, teacher workshops, and conference talks. Students convinced me long ago that my nice-looking calculus graphs could qualify on their own as art, so I decided that makes me an artist!
Math has long been perceived by many as being separate from art, but as creators and viewers of math art, we enjoy using both halves of our brains! After a 35-year teaching career, I am now a 3D math artist and interactive book author, trying to bring the joy of mathematics to an unsuspecting audience.

Hilbert Soap Film
Hilbert Soap Film
43 x 50 cm
Inkjet Print on Canvas
2020

The 3D Hilbert Curve is the limit of square-cornered paths that increasingly fill up the unit cube. I told Mathematica to replace the paths with spline curves. Here we have Hilbert splines 1, 2, and 3, joined by soap films between the 1-2 and the 2-3, which are just linear morphs between two parametric paths. The films then cast a translucent 'fake shadow' on the beach. (Click the link for an interactive 3D Hilbert Spline model!)