Well, that's what I mumbled to myself after discovering the work of a well known Dutch artist during a visit of the Escher in Het Paleis in The Hague, Holland.
M.C Escher (1898-1972) has created numerous fascinating artwork dominated by optical illusions and perspective. M.C. Escher - The Official Website
I loved in particular his mathematical works of tessellation's and I became curious about the process of creating a tessellation. A tessellation is a pattern made of identical shapes which must fit together without any gaps and the shapes should not overlap.
So I wondered if I could create a papercut in the style of a tessellation, and this was to be my challenge this summer, the aim to have it ready just in time to show it off at this year's Brighton Art Fair!
And a challenge it really was!
After looking into some online maths lessons, most of them targeted to children. Easy! I said to myself!
Really!
Not so! You try! On the principle of it I understood it well but when it came to create a shape to resemble what I wanted it became quite difficult.
I spent quite a few hours, drawing, cutting, sticking, reassembling, huffing and puffing disapprovingly at my numerous unsatisfactory attempts!
I had found a beautiful map from a 1947 Dutch School Atlas featuring both cities of Amsterdam and Rotterdam which I wanted to use and I finally settled for a simple shape with an image inside, which repeated along the page became my interpretation of an "Escher like tessellation".
It's nearly finished and I shall be showing it at the Brighton Art Fair this september (26th, 27th and 28th)
In the meantime, here is a photo of the work in process.
It was a fun challenge! Might do another one!
Oh and do come along to the Brighton Art Fair this September, it would be lovely to see you!
