2023 Bridges Conference Art Exhibition
John Nicholson
Artists
Statement
As a child, I was interested in mathematics and art. Eventually, I discovered computers and programming. Once I realized I could connect computer programs to both math and art, I spent many hours writing many small and large programs that could generate all types of images including fractals, 3d renderings, complex curves, and generative art. I continue to explore the intersection of math, art and computer science, both as a pastime and as a way to inspire the students in the computer science courses I teach.
Artworks
Four rose curves and a circle
41.0 x 41.0 cm
Inkjet on Aluminum
2023
I have been interested in developing ways to capture curves in motion and render them in interesting ways. This image is part of an on-going project in which I add together multiple curves, some of which are rotating and/or moving and others that are stationary, in order to create new curves that swirl and evolve as they move. The resulting curves’ motions are captured as 2-dimensional histograms, and in the final images the frequencies in the histogram are mapped to pixels and their colors. For this image, four rose curves, each with different numbers of petals and moving along the x- and y- axes, were added to a stationary circle centered around the origin.