Sarah Poiani

Statement

I am a Ph.D. candidate studying commutative algebra at the University of New Mexico and I expect to graduate in the Spring of 2024. I have been interested in fiber arts as long as I’ve been interested in mathematics. I first learned to knit in high school and have since branched out and learned how to crochet, cross stitch, sew, and quilt. I learned how to quilt in 2020 and have been expanding my skill set ever since. I try to learn something new with every project and when I learned about the einstein tile last year, I knew it would make an interesting quilt. My submissions show the two projects I completed based on this 13-sided shape.

Artworks

This quilt is inspired by the einstein tile discovered last year. Each tile was divided into its 8 component kites to make it more feasible to sew. It is quilted with the spectre tile overlaying each einstein tile to show that the spectre, unlike the einstein, does not need to be reflected to tile the plane. The border is an arrangement of trapezoids (referred to by quilters as half-hexies) and demonstrates a periodic tiling.