Underlying Structure

Moderator: Kathy Strauss

Panelists: Dr. R. Clarissa Howison, Susan Happersett, Amber Heaton, Lorin Roser

According to the physicist Richard Feynman* the language Nature – or God – talks, is calculus, or more broadly, mathematics. This panel will explore some of the chapters in Nature’s math book, as illuminated through the aesthetics of artists. Some artists find the Fibonacci sequence describing webs and networks, while others discover specific mathematical functions that describe growth patterns and even music. Still others determine that iterations can create patterns such as fractals, and in dynamical systems describe everything from landscapes to movement in space. During this panel discussion the artists and mathematician will describe the mathematical underpinnings of Nature that they probe in their work.

* From The Language God Talks, Herman Wouk, 2010

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Kathy Strauss is an artist/scientist with a BA in Art, with minors in Mathematics and Biology, living in an historic house in Baltimore. She currently works in malaria research with the University of Maryland, Baltimore, and exhibits her artwork extensively in the Baltimore metropolitan area. Venues include Creative Alliance, Goucher College, Pyramid Atlantic, and ArtScape.

Dr. R. Clarissa Howison went to school for a very, very long time and ended up with a Ph.D. in Mathematics from the University of Cincinnati. After ten years of teaching and research, in an effort to do something more lucrative, she went to work for the Federal Government. She lives in a large, dusty, antique house in Baltimore which contains some art from her mother, her daughter, and Kathy Strauss.

Susan Happersett‘s drawings, paintings, videos and artist’s books explore the aesthetic qualities of sequences, series and formulae. Growth patterns like the Fibonacci Sequence are frequent themes in her work and all work is done by hand, without computer assistance, to emphasize the organic nature of the patterns. Her work is widely collected by Museums and Universities. Having earned graduate degrees in both Mathematics and Art, Happersett writes a blog Fibonaccisusan about current trends in Math/Art.

Amber Heaton collects materials and data about natural systems including patterns of light and time. Her work has been exhibited at Parrish Museum of Art, International Print Center New York, Highpoint Center for Printmaking, and other venues internationally. Heaton received her MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design in 2012, her BFA from the University of Utah in 2009, a BUS degree in Human Diversity from the University of Utah in 1998.

Lorin Roser is an Animator/Architect/Composer who studied at UCLA/ Princeton and has worked with Stelarc in 2016. Panel Talks include WhiteBox Gallery with John Cage (2016) and Joel Chadabe and Aviva Rhamani (2016). His work is shown at CENTRAL BOOKING, Alferro Gallery, New Museum, Sumei Gallery, Shun Gallery, Shanghai, Univ.of Tennessee, and the Museum of Asian Culture, Texas, with work reproduced in “Digital Media: Transformations in Human Communication” (2^nd edition) and “Envisioning Diaspora”, (World Journal 2009).