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The Geometry of Art and Life By Matila Ghyka ( Dover Publications )
Release Date: 1977-06-01
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List Price: $9.95
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Product Description
This classic study probes the geometric interrelationships between art and life in discussions that range from Plato, Pythagoras and Archimedes to modern architecture and art, flowers, shells and marine life, the human face and much, much more. Also explored: the Golden Section, geometrical shapes on the plane, geometrical shapes in space, crystal lattices and many other fascinating topics.
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 Managing Geometry In Time and Space ( rutham18 )
The Geometry Of Art And Life by Matila Ghyka is an interesting book that pertains primarily to ancient information regarding the fiine arts. Geometry unites all aspects of this book. All aspects of geometry are utilized to manage the organic and inorganic in time and space.
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Excellent and Insightful
This short paperback is a hidden gem. It contains so many insightful pithy clues about life, along with easy to understand mathematical paradigms. Every item will have you saying is this math, is it philosophy, is it religion, or is just true in many, many ways.
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Shows how mathematics intertwines with the arts and biology ( calvinnme )
This book is a unique one that combines mathematics with art and somewhat quantifies that which we call beauty. The mathematical concepts presented are not difficult. If you've been exposed to algebra and geometry you should have no trouble. What will definitely help is having studied art, and in particular, art appreciation. With no real feeling for symmetry or form you might not appreciate this book as much as you could.
The book's central focus is to show that patterns, themes of symmetry, and spirals discovered in living forms and living growth are the same themes of proportion that were used by Greek and Gothic architects. It also shows that the proportion known as "The Golden Section" appears to be the principle invariant. The Golden Section's algebraic and geometric properties are discussed, as are its role in biology and in aesthetics.
This book is very accessible, but it is not something you will want to read quickly cover to cover. Instead, the best way to read this book is to read a short section, make sure you understand the underlying mathematics, and then think about what that particular section of the book says about the application of that mathematics to the arts or biology before returning to the book for further reading.
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 Lacking depth in analysis ( ali_zaidi )
Ghyka attempts to show the objects in nature are not randomly formed; he begins the with the concept of ratio and proportion in the plane; the golden section; and then to the regular polygons and geometric shapes in 3 dimensions. Then he rambles onto hypothesizing why an architecture design may seem striking. In doing so he makes gross assumptions which are to the point of being forced to fit his theories. The basic concepts that he delves; one can familiarize oneself with by a quick reference on the internet. Hence I do not recommend spending the time and money to read this book.
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A good book focused on Phi ( digital_puer )
I'm not a mathematician, but I still found this book to be readable. It is largely focused on the Golden Section (Phi) and related proportions, including Fibonacci numbers, sqrt(Phi), etc. The explanation of how to derive this number is clearly explained in the first few chapters. The following chapters show how Phi is related to most things we see everyday, including architecture, 5-point animals, crystal latticies, art, and music. This book is quite old, so the illustrations seem rather antiquated. Nonetheless, the quantity and clarity of these illustrations are impressive.The writing was clear, but the concepts were occasionally difficult to understand. The author made mention of "gnomic" growth a number of times without really giving a single clear definition. Also, I felt that a number of the tie-ins between Phi and architecture were a bit of a stretch. Most likely you could overlay any graph over a blueprint and see any proportion you'd want to see. At any rate, this book has gotten me interested in this subject, and I will be looking for more books on Phi.
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