The Islands of Benoît Mandelbrot

The Bard Graduate Center recently closed a show entitled "The Islands ofBenoît Mandelbrot:Fractals, Chaos, and theMateriality of Thinking". Interesting, for a computer scientist to have a show in what has historically been an institution dedicated to showcasing the arts.

Benoit Mandelbrot is perhaps most famous for his work involving fractals (including helping to generate the mountains in Star Trek II). Fractals are shapes that exhibit the interesting property of having self-similarity. This fractal was named after Mandelbrot:

People call it the "Mandelbrot Set". It's a "set" because this shape is actually a visual map to a collection of special Julia Set fractals.

This "art" show at the Bard Graduate Center focused on the visual record of the mathematical discovery of the mysterious properties of these shapes:

It's hard to find visual artifacts to document the lifespan of a mathematical discovery. Several pieces in the show are obviously sketches of ideas that have yet to come to full fruition.

• New York Times coverage of the Islands of Benoit Mandelbrot
• Exhibition Catalog- The Islands of Benoit Mandelbrot: Fractals, Chaos, and the Materiality of Thinking
• The Computational Beauty of Nature: Computer Explorations of Fractals, Chaos, Complex Systems, and Adaptation 
• Making the Genesis Effect in Star Trek II

Beauty and the Unseen

Part of the Feynman Series, this video adds beautiful insight to a portion of Richard Feynman's narration of The Pleasure of Finding Things Out. One beautiful point made in the first half of Beauty is the contrast between how an artist and a scientist might view beauty. Feynman points out that while an artist might have a more "refined sense of aesthetic" than a scientist, a scientist might see the flower not only for the immediate impression of its' beauty. He observes that a scientist might also see the hidden and unseen forces (such as the evolutionary need to attract insects) that have caused the flower to look as wonderfully as it does.

Richard Feynman was a famous professor of Physics. He also explored his own more traditional visual artistry.

Art Forms of Nature

Ernst Haeckel. Biologist. Zoologist. Artist. Irregular symmetry dominates his work.
He idealizes natural forms in the same way that conceptual artists and mathematicians idealize geometry.
His drawings were published as a book, The Art Forms of Nature (that's a free download, by the way).

• Haeckel's Art Forms from Nature CD-ROM and Book (Dover Electronic Clip Art) 
• Haeckel on Wikipedia  
• The Fractal Geometry of Nature 
• The Computational Beauty of Nature: Computer Explorations of Fractals, Chaos, Complex Systems, and Adaptation