After graduating from high school, at my father's suggestion, I went to Harlem to study architecture. However, his knowledge of physics and mathematics did not shape him into an architect, but ignited his passion for painting art. He met Samuel Musquita, an influential artist in the Netherlands at that time, and studied and studied the printmaking techniques of various materials under his guidance. From 1923 to 1935, he is full of enthusiasm for life and shows realism in his creation. He once lived in Italy and was intoxicated by the beauty of villas in southern Italy. He tried his best to sketch and create, and those rolling mountains, towns built by mountains and alleys full of life were all included in his works under his meat cleaver. Later he fell in love and created a series of Genesis prints for love. The last one is Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. They got married and settled in Rome. However, although his printmaking skills had reached perfection at this time, the Renaissance monuments and baroque buildings in Rome could not burn any of his creative passion. He advocates simplicity and nature and is tired of the domineering of this city. After the rise of the fascist regime, he looked at the fanatical crowd in surprise and was angry at the chaos in the world. Since then, realism has disappeared in his works.
In the late 1930s, when escher visited Spain, he was attracted by the decorative patterns on Moore's buildings. The regular color patterns in the background look simple and even a little monotonous. But in escher's mind, it opened the door to the infinite transformation space of the printmaking world. He said that geometry is just boring, as long as you give him a life, it will be fun. Therefore, in a regular triangle, a quadrilateral or a hexagon, fish, birds and reptiles are the background of each other, changing each other in two-dimensional space and three-dimensional space, which has become his favorite creative theme for a period of time and a game that he has never tired of playing all his life. Those deformation series, cycle series, and his "Day and Night" made him famous all over the world. But this is only part of his creative achievements.
From 1950s to 1960s, his works had a deeper vision. He began to use human visual errors to make his works play in three-dimensional space. His works, such as Convex and Concave, Up and Down, Observation Tower and Waterfall, vividly express all kinds of absurd results with very delicate details, which have been interesting for decades.
Escher and Picasso were contemporaries. The deformed objects in Picasso's works not only explore new painting styles, but also are artists' perception of the distorted world in front of them. Although most of escher's later works are abstract themes such as architecture or geometric figures, who can say that it is not escher's thinking about the world because of the rules revealed, the contradictions and absurdities under reasonable appearances, and the jigsaw puzzle with angels and demons as the background?
Perhaps his profound understanding of mathematics, architecture and philosophy hindered his communication with his peers. He has almost always been a maverick in the art world, and there is no successor. He can't even belong to any art school in the 20th century. However, he is regarded as a confidant by many scientists. His prints have been used as the covers of many scientific works and magazines. 1954 The International Mathematical Association held a solo exhibition for him in Amsterdam, which is rare in the history of modern art.
At the end of 1990s, people found that the visual simulation in escher's works 30 years ago was so similar to today's virtual three-dimensional video and digital methods. His various image aesthetics are almost replicas of today's computer image vision, and they are full of the mixed breath of intelligence in the electronic age and the Middle Ages. So some people say that escher's art is a modern art that truly transcends the times and goes deep into self-rationality. Some people call him the originator of stereoscopic pictures.
But escher's works never refuse the audience. All his works are full of humor, mystery, wit and fairy-tale visual charm. Philosophers, mathematicians and physicists can explain it very deeply, and every ordinary person can find his own feelings, even children.
Some intertwined circles, an endless staircase or two scenes seen from two different angles ... Half a century ago, An Impossible World, written by the famous Dutch printmaker escher, is still unique and popular all over the world, and its biography has been officially published in China recently. This beautifully bound biography is called Magic Mirror-The Impossible World of escher. This was written by Bruno Ernst, a friend of escher and a Dutch mathematician, more than 20 years ago and was corrected by the artist himself. With beautiful language and 250 beautiful pictures, the book describes the life and creation of escher, an "artistic geek", and his unique views on printmaking. ...
Most people in China first saw escher's works in the early 1980s. At that time, escher's famous Waterfall was published in the center insert of the first issue of Reader's Digest (now Reader), which should be escher's first mass communication in China.
Escher's influence among intellectuals in China is undoubtedly attributed to GEB, an eternal golden belt (1984), one of the series "Towards the Future" by Sichuan People's Publishing House. This booklet is just a simplified version of a great book by American scholar Hou Shida, whose original work won the Pulitzer Prize in the United States. 12 years later, 1996, the Chinese translation of Godel, Eisele and Bach-Masterpieces of Different Treasures was published. This book compares the mathematician Godel, the artist escher and the musician Bach, and thinks that they all have * * * characteristics in different fields of human thinking. However, this book is actually the Six Classics of Hou Shida. What he said about escher was the escher he saw, not escher himself.
Exploration of recording thinking
Escher is an artist who cannot be classified. Many of his prints originate from paradox, illusion and double meanings. He tried to ignore their inconsistency and pursue the integrity of the picture, or let those who could not be present at the same time be present at the same time. Like a magician who has cast magic, he presents a fascinating "impossible world" in three dimensions with logic and superb painting skills that almost no one can get rid of. Many of his works, such as The Painter's Hand, Convex and Concave, Gallery and The Limit of Circle and Depth, are masterpieces handed down from generation to generation.
Many artists were inspired by escher's printmaking achievements, and even produced a school which can be named "escher Doctrine". However, people often have their own needs for the study of escher, and misunderstandings about escher are also common. Simply from the perspective of science, psychology or aesthetics, it is impossible to make a fair evaluation of his works. As Song Tian, a Chinese translator of Magic Mirror-escher's Impossible World and a professor of philosophy at Peking University, said, "escher is actually a thinker, but his works are not expressed in words, but in paintings. Each of his works is a summary and record of his ideological exploration. "
Artists or scientists?
Escher is unique and unique, and his works form a self-sufficient and rich world. For this world, ordinary people often can't enter the door, just regard it as an interesting and strange picture. Scholars, on the other hand, have their own needs, some of which are subtle and some are talking to themselves. Misunderstanding of escher is even more common. For example, some people often call escher a master of illusion graphics, while others sometimes say that escher is proficient in natural science or mathematics.
Of course, because of the problem and way of thinking, escher is closer to scientists than artists. So it is not surprising that his works were first accepted by scientists, who discovered the value and significance of escher's works. Mathematicians, physicists and psychologists, such as Hou Shida, explain escher from their own perspective, or use escher to explain their theories. Yang Zhenning's short story A Brief History of the Discovery of Elementary Particles is based on escher's Knight. In the so-called scientific and cultural translations published by China in recent years, there are also discussions about escher from time to time. For example, Penrose's The Emperor's New Brain.
Judging from the current mass context, it is an artist's honor to express "scientific thoughts" and be appreciated by scientists. However, this understanding just ignores the value of escher as an independent thinker. Although escher has many friends who are scientists, several of them have influenced his works. But in my opinion, escher didn't try to express the thoughts of "scientists", just wanted to express his own thoughts.
The value of Mirror-escher's Impossible World lies in its systematic comments on the painter from escher's own perspective. Moreover, this comment is based on first-hand information and has been recognized by escher himself.
It has been said that Aysil represents the sense of space in the era of non-Euclidean geometry, and its basic feature is the curvature of space, which makes sense. The bending of space makes winding possible and "finite unbounded" possible. Today, we know that physical space can be bent by gravity, but it is unbounded but finite: unbounded does not mean infinite.