a guide bo o
k
the to understand in g
of ho w w e se
e and creat e
the world
Clearl . y it is not the eye but the soul that sees
A giude book to the understanding of how we see and create the world.
We all learned to live in a systematic environment that has been constructed following all sorts of instructions to achieve certain completeness. But our mind, deep in our unconscious, acts like a decorator, creating the variety of results on top of the systems. This is how we create this colourful and abundant world.
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Everything goes back to human nature
First, lets look into some hidden systems in nature. It is important to bear in mind that Nature’s surface beauty conveys no more than a hint of loveliness hidden within. The mathematics is not in its skin: it must be discovered. [H. E. Huntley, 1970, The Divine Proportion] From snowflakes, honeycombs, the contour spiral shapes of shells, to pine cons, sunflowers and human body proportions, we discovered numerous systems behind them. Systems like symmetry, pattern formation, proportion, the famous Golden ratio and Fibonacci sequence. Psychologist Adolf Zeising presents evidences of the existence of golden ratio in nature. From the arrangements of branches along the stem of plants and of veins in leaves to the skeletons of animals and the branching of their veins and nerves, to the proportions of chemical compounds and the geometry of crystals, he saw the golden ratio operating as a universal law. The Golden Ratio is a universal law, in which is contained the ground-principle of all formative striving for beauty and completeness in the realms of both nature and art, and which permeates, as a paramount spiritual ideal, all structures, forms and proportions, whether cosmic or individual, organic or inorganic, acoustic or optical; which finds its fullest realization, however, in the human form. [Adolf Zeising]
Just as many plants and animals share golden section proportions, our bodies do as well. Ancient Greek scholar and architect Marcus Vitruvius Pollio believed that Architectural templates should be based on the likeness of the perfectly proportioned human body where “harmony” exists among all parts. Therefore, we use the systems discovered from nature in our creation, believing they are the rules to achieve harmonious beauty and completeness. Besides Golden ratio, another impression of harmonious beauty has a very long tradition associated with Symmetry. When this symmetry or co-modulation between the elements and between the elements and the whole is achieved in the right way, we obtain harmony. [Marcus Vitruvius Pollio] We meant harmonious in the sense of being aesthetically pleasing. We prefer the word ”harmonious” to ”aesthetic”, which is probably more common, as the aesthetic feeling in certainly highly individual, and we cannot hope to define it accurately. The long tradition of art criticism is convincing on this point. [Michele Emmer, 1993, The Visual Mind II ]
Stencil sets The pentagon has golden section proportion, along with circle, square, triangle and hexagon are all selfsymmetrical shapes. Using these shapes , we can structure all kinds of symmetrical combonations that achieve centain balance, and the structures we created can disguise behind the added elements on top of it. Here, we are using the stencil sets attached with this book to experience this system. We discovered the systems in nature, developed and applied them to build up our environments, following instructions that we have learned to believe are the principles of achieving beauty and completeness.
The square is as high and a man with his arms outstretched. It signifies the idea of enclosure, of home, of settlement. -Bruno Munari
The circle is related to the divine: a simple circle has since ancient times represented eternity, since it has no beginning and no end. -Bruno munari
Clearly it is not the eye but the soul that see.
The equilateral triangle is the most stable form with its fixed structure of three equal sides and thress equal angles. Its distinctive structures hint the growth or movement in nature.
The honeycombs for example, constructed from nearly identical hexagons is an important sample of repetitive geometrical pattern formation in nature.
The pentagon and star pentagram have golden sections proportions, as the ratios of the sides of the triangles in a start pentagram is 1:1.618.
Systems are like the bones under our skins, which cannot be seen in the appearances. Our creations, although having the track of following certain systems, due to some reason have the same result. the truth is, these perfect systems only exist in mathematics,in geometry for instance; like the growth patterns of the nautilus and other shells are actually never exact golden section proportions, the so-called evidences of systems in nature, are never “exactly perfect”. As many artists might agreed, the slight difference obviously brings out certain spirit to the object, but does it make the object not completed anymore? The answer obviously is “no”. Not only it brings out the spirit to the object, but also creates the diverse results on top of the systems. So what is the explaination to this phenomenon? we believe The answer is in ourselves. Our eyes, we can consider it as the knowledge, as those systems and instructions we learned to achieve the completeness. But our soul can be seen as our unconscious, which brings out the spirit of our human nature and our individuality.
In order to understand how we create, we have to first understand how we see. Here we use beauty as an example. What is beauty? The power to appreciate beauty appears to be a human endowment and this suggests that we should seek its origin and its purpose in human nature, in the nature that distinguishes us from the animal creation. [H. E. Huntley, 1970, The Divine Proportion] It is difficult to confine beauty to either objective or subjective categories, maybe both, however it seems to be more satisfactory to regard it as an interaction between the mind and an object, which arouses emotion, and emotion is regarded by psychologists as activities of the unconscious mind. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder Mathematician James W. McAllister interpreted how we claim that a certain entity is beautiful is that the entity has a property named ”Beauty”, which the observer has perceived; that “Beauty” is a value which is projected into or attributed to objects by observers. Whether an observer projects beauty into an object is determined by two factors: the aesthetic criteria held by the observer, and the object’s intrinsic properties. Therefore we understand that our perceptions toward the observed object are determined by our unconscious mind, and the property in the observed object is the power to evoke the emotions deep in our unconscious; so aesthetic experience for instance, is an emotional, rather than a rational mental activity.
ar t e d d y be
of a old dress
the flower pattern
a purple book
yel
r ed t-shir t white
low ba ll
bunny my diary
my childhoods friends the
bla
m u m ’ s wedding
r b l ue ca
c k pen
white fences
gown
the old bike
g reen eyes
the old relationships
my blond hair se b r o w n hor
sunrise. sunset and e h t , s s a r color of the sky, The green g
e growth of tree ght, th s. i n d an y a d The alteration of
des, the alteration of seaso i t g n i ns . the rising the ebb
of eyes, the colour of hairs olour c e th our beaches, the colour l o c e of r th ain .
line of horizon, the sh ape of m e v r u c ounta e the col in, our of skins, th
of stars, the white m oon, the light e dark s th ky in n ight.
light of sun, the sh the apes o f clou d s .
Plantonic solids
1. Colour and decorate the surface of the models with your creativity, follow your intuitions! [An example showing next page] 2. Cut out the model from the book, keeping well away from the outline. 3. Carefully fold all the lines. 4. Crease firmly, do not start to glue until all the creases are done. 5. There are alphabets on the flap which show the best order in which to glue them together.
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The five regular solids are very special shapes and are fine examples of systems that was discovered and identified by the knowledge of ancient Greek. A proof that they are the only five convex regular polyhedra, which can exist, was first given by Euclid and was credited to the Greek philosopher Plato. The five solids including Tetrahedron, Cube, Octahedron, Icosahedrons and Dodecahedron. Developed from regular polygons, the solids are obviously associated with geometrical systems; the Dodecahedron for instance, is the development of the pentagon in three dimensions, which is dominated by the famous golden section proportion. The Regular solids also have an interesting characteristic that was introduced by Plato, which was a nice example of how our collective unconscious interacts with our knowledge. Plato related the solids with the basic elements of nature; it was an intuitive justification of how the solids look and feel like. He associated the classical elements with the regular solids. Earth was associated with the cube, air with the octahedron, water with the Icosahedrons, and fire with the tetrahedron: the heat of fire feels sharp and stabbing; like little tetrahedron. Air is made of the octahedron; its minuscule components are so smooth that one can barely feel it. Water, the Icosahedrons, flows out of one’s hand when picked up, as if it is made of tiny little balls. The highly un-spherical solid, the hexahedron, represents earth. The dodecahedron has been seen as the quintessence of the universe as a whole; its twelve regular facet corresponded to the twelve sign of zodiac, was a symbol of the universe.
Our perception consequently determines our creativity. And God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness”. [Genesis 1, v.26] After the likeness of his Maker, man is born to create, to fashion beauty and to originate new values. This truth awakens a resonant response deep within us, for we know that one of the most intense joys that the soul of man can experience is the spiritual satisfaction associated with the moment of orgasm of creation. This inborn love of beauty, our human heritage, must find expression if we are to be happy. Man is by nature a creator. [H. E. Huntley, 1970] One of the systems we are going to introduce and experience here, is the pattern formation of triangle, square and hexagon. Among all the regular polygons, only these three shapes allow a complete equipartition of filling of the plane; they are the only polygons whose angles at the summit (60°, 90°, 120°) are sub-multiples of 360°. It is easier to fill the plane when several kinds of regular polygons are used; these partitions produce a number of patterns which can be used for pavement of mosaics. Here we are using the attached mirror pieces to understand the system and to experience the process of tcreative mind; how we learned the systems and how we go beyond the systems in the process of creation. how the eye(the knowledge) and the soul (the unconscious and individuality) play different roles in the creative process.
Triangle / Square / Hexagon 1. Use the triangle, square and hexagon mirror pieces attached with this book. 2. Try to fill in the black blocks with the pieces. 3. At the first 2 pages, take reference from the patterns outside the blocks to understand and familiar the systems. 4. After experienced the systems, try to fill in the blocks with your own intuitions at the last 2 pages, and compare them with the related objects.
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To sum up, when the eyes [the knowledge] see the systems [what we learned] on a certain object, the soul [the unconscious] sees the spirit [the human nature or our individuality] behind it. Consequently, in the process of creation, the eyes [the knowledge] create the systems or structures following instructions [what we learned], that normally can not easily be seen in the appearance, when our soul [the unconscious] creates the spirit [the human nature or the individuality] to achieve the true completeness, which may not be mathematically perfect, but most satisfactory. When we mention everything derives from the human nature, it doesn’t mean the perfectly proportioned physical human body where some systems derive from, but the spiritual and emotional human mind. Not like the solid systems we created and followed, the human mind is irrational, mostly deep in our unconscious and is in charge of the emotional reactions that could not be restricted by rational systems, which also means there’s always much more possibilities waiting to be discovered; and that is exactly what creates this colourful and abundant world.
After all, it is our souls not our eyes that see.