There are many aspects of art which relate to maths and this was explained in an input from Anna Robb.  The part which captured my interest straight away was how Fibonacci affects so many different things in nature and other places.

I taught the Fibonacci sequence at my school placement in first year when we were doing sequences within the maths topic.  The sequence is – 0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34……… The Fibonacci sequence is created from adding the previous number to the next so 1 + 1 = 2, 1 + 2 = 3, 2 + 3 = 5…….  Some children were able to work this out straight away and others struggled.  I think the more advanced children who were able to work this out would be interested in the different parts of the Fibonacci sequence which relate to other parts of the world other than just a sequence.  Actually using the facts of Fibonacci would make it more relevant to their learning and would capture their interest and promote their maths knowledge and understanding.

Bellos looks into the Fibonacci in nature even more with the garden as he looks at the number of petals on flowers – 3 petals: lily and Iris, 5 petals: pink and buttercup, 8 petals: delphinium…. Each of these numbers is in the Fibonacci sequence and furthermore, the likes of sunflowers, pinecones, and others relate to this too.

The golden rectangle and logarithmic spiral are both related to Fibonacci and we created the spiral in our maths and art input.  To create this spiral using the sequence each square is placed beside each other. This is mind-blowing when it is compared to nature and a nautilus shell which has the exact same spiral as the one created by the Fibonacci sequence.

Each of these examples emphasises the connectedness of history of maths and art.  Connectedness is one of the fundamental principles which Liping Ma highlights in her revolutionary book about teaching mathematics and the importance of profound understanding in fundamental mathematics.

Reference:

Bello, Alex (2010) Alex’s Adventures in Numberland London: Bloomsbury

Ma, Liping (2010) Knowing and Teaching elementary mathematics: teachers’ understanding of fundamental mathematics in China and the United States New York: Routledge.

Robb, A. (2017) Maths and Art [Lecture to MA2 Education Students] ED21006: Discovering Mathematics. Dundee University: 26 October 2017.