Leonardo Sticks

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: [Art_dept] Leonardo stick demonstration
Date: Mon, 10 May 2004 16:00:51 -0400
From: Chris Glass
To: Art190, Art275
Tomorrow afternoon between 1:30 and about 4:30 the ART 275 architecture class will assemble in front of the VAC to demonstrate the construction of a dome system invented by Leonardo da Vinci and described in his notebooks. The system uses straight wooden beams with no connections, and it holds itself up through the working of an extremely simple rule of overlapping. With the only rule, Leonardo showed four or five different patterns, and Dutch sculptor Rinus Roelofs has come up with over one hundred different variations.

Attached are the original Leonardo page and a photograph of the group of architects and mathematicians (including me) who met in Italy last June to see if this actually worked. As you can see from the photograph, it did. (Leonardo: Architecture and Mathematics 25-28 June 2003, Vinci, Italy »)

The Bowdoin model will use smaller elements (eight foot 2x3s instead of twelve foot 4x4s), but the effect should be similar.

Please plan to drop by (toward the end of the time may be more dramatic) and to let your students know. If there is sufficient interest, we may do a second demonstration during reading period.

There are 5 pages of images from this project. Use the bottom navigation to explore.

drawing
Drawing

davincisticks
Italy

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