M. C. Escher
M. C. Escher
Maurits Cornelis Escher; 17 June 1898 – 27 March 1972) was a Dutch graphic artist who made mathematically inspired woodcuts, lithographs, and mezzotints...
NationalityDutch
ProfessionArtist
Date of Birth17 June 1898
fifty pleasant seems strange work
I've been doing this kind of work for over fifty years now, and nothing in this strange and frightening world seems more pleasant to me.
building possible untrained
At first I had no idea at all of the possibility of systematically building up my figures. I did not know ... this was possible for someone untrained in mathematics,
work games serious
My work is a game, a very serious game.
earth salt wonder
Wonder is the salt of the earth.
education art jigsaw-puzzles
Science and art sometimes can touch one another, like two pieces of the jigsaw puzzle which is our human life, and that contact may be made across the boderline between the two respective domains.
education book math
I never got a pass mark in math ... Just imagine - mathematicians now use my prints to illustrate their books.
stars space trying
So let us then try to climb the mountain, not by stepping on what is below us, but to pull us up at what is above us, for my part at the stars; amen.
beautiful order years
Although I am even now still a layman in the area of mathematics, and although I lack theoretical knowledge, the mathematicians, and in particular the crystallographers, have had considerable influence on my work of the last twenty years. The laws of the phenomena around us--order, regularity, cyclical repetition, and renewals--have assumed greater and greater importance for me. The awareness of their presence gives me peace and provides me with support. I try in my prints to testify that we live in a beautiful and orderly world, and not in a formless chaos, as it sometimes seems.
beautiful fun two
I try in my prints to testify that we live in a beautiful and orderly world, not in a chaos without norms, even though that is how it sometimes appears. My subjects are also often playful: I cannot refrain from demonstrating the nonsensicalness of some of what we take to be irrefutable certainties. It is, for example, a pleasure to deliberately mix together objects of two and three dimensions, surface and spatial relationships, and to make fun of gravity.
beautiful trying world
I try in my prints to testify that we live in a beautiful and orderly world, and not in a formless chaos, as it sometimes seems.
beautiful hurt art
To tell you the truth, I am rather perplexed by the concept of 'art'. What one person considers to be 'art' is often not 'art' to another. 'Beautiful' and 'ugly' are old-fashioned concepts that are seldom applied these days; perhaps justifiably, who knows? Something repulsive, which gives you a moral hangover, and hurts your ears or eyes, may well be art. Only 'kitsch' is not art - we're all agreed about that. Indeed, but what is 'kitsch'? If only I knew!
originality illusion
Originality is merely an illusion.
beautiful want pure
The things I want to express are so beautiful and pure.
beautiful passion important
At moments of great enthusiasm it seems to me that no one in the world has ever made something this beautiful and important.