2021 Joint Mathematics Meetings
Erika Iris
Artists
Statement
Recently I've been illustrating a whimsical history of math and science in a series I call GLDN I have completed 30 illustrations so far; I hope to have 78 by the end Each drawing has an accompanying text, a straightforward description of the person or idea as well as a few lines of poetry, like a Zen koan I intend to publish it as a book.
Artworks
Poincare and The Three Body Problem
43 x 25 cm
charcoal on paper
2020
This illustration celebrates the colossal 19th century mathematician Poincare who anticipated Chaos Theory and solved The Three Body Problem. The shapes making up his face and hair are inspired by graphs of strange attractors. He was in charge of coal mining operations in France, so I drew this in charcoal
punch holes in space like paper mâché
be swallowed by the vortex
or saunter forever away
Euler and the Seven Bridges of Königsberg
43 x 25 cm
ink on paper
2020
Here we celebrate Leonard Euler and one of the most beautiful equations in all of mathematics.
This illustration depicts the moon as the unit circle, the revolutions are cyclical in the complex plane, like the phases of the moon with positive and negative values. Euler stands in the middle of a castle, topologically equivalent to his Konigsberg Bridge Problem. Can you pass over each stairway and ladder exactly once?
spin like a Sufi
in all your manifestations
your template remains unchanged
we are all bounded