A mathematician, like a painter or a poet, is a maker of patterns.
G. H. Hardy.
A true mathematician has an unlimited imagination. And mathematicians use blackboards to reveal the visual beauty of mathematics using shapes, figures, formulas, and conjectures. Although many people replaced their chalkboards with whiteboards and digital presentations, masters of mathematicians remain loyal to chalk to puzzle their ideas and communicate their research.
If you check a good mathematician’s blackboard after a lecture, you would be amazed all the time. That’s why photographer Jessica Wynne has been presenting remarkable examples of mathematicians’ blackboards for a long time. Her photos provide an illuminating meditation on the unique relationships between mathematics, art, and creativity.
In one interview, she says, “I am attracted to the timeless beauty and physicality of the mathematicians’ chalkboard and to their higher aspiration to uncover the truth and solve a problem. Their imagination guides them, and they see images first, not words. They see pictures before meaning.”
We have compiled more than thirty works of Jessica Wynne’s for you! We believe these photos will make your day. By the way, Jessica Wynne put her works in a book, “Do Not Erase.” It is a beautiful book for your library.
