Inside my brain: lasers and gold

Inside my brain: lasers and gold

This was going to be a triumphant article about a stellar idea, a struggle of problem solving, learning curves, dangerous lasers, and the final, exuberant splendid result in all its plasticky-golden glory. Yeah, well… The idea! …so the idea: to laser engrave a bunch of slices of my brain in transparent acrylic, stack them… it ...
Sensory homonculus

Sensory homonculus

Sensory homonculus: of all nonsensical stuff I have made, this sensory homonculus is up there. Stoneware clay, watercolour, acrylic paint ...
horrible 3d exploded pie chart

Charts: the horror of three dimensions

We have really cool tools to make information and data visible, I find joy in beautiful visualisation of complex information. I see, I learn. But here is what makes me furious: three-dimensional charts. Never, ever make diagrams and charts 3D. NEVER. Here is why: Graphs, diagrams and maps are tools to ask questions. Sometimes they are ...
3D printing: liver and silver

3D printing: liver and silver

I am guessing we have all heard of the exciting new technology and research were it is possible to print organs. To me this is mind-blowing on so many levels: ponder the implications. We could print entire organ systems, repair damage, replace tissue, digitally mould external and internal organs. Just thinking about what this could ...
dodecahedron

Paper and math: the 3D world

Math can be beautiful. The artist and professor George Heart Makes amazing sculptures, and he generously shares some of the templates so that the less talented of us can reproduce them. Here, I have made a model of his Frabjous in corrugated cardboard: I am a little partial to the dodocahedron, the 12-faced Platonic solid. The ...
The gorgeous polyhedra sculptures of George Hart

The gorgeous polyhedra sculptures of George Hart

George Hart is a professor in engineering and a freelance mathematical sculptor, designer and artist. With the basis in mathematics, he creates stunning sculptures in a variety of materials and sizes, in principle, based on basic polyhedra. But his sculptures are anything but basic. The fact that this shape .... can turn into this, delights ...