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Featured Talks
Thursday 7pm, Grand Ballroom: Math and Art: The Good, the Bad, and the Pretty
Annalisa Crannell, Franklin & Marshall College
Abstract: How do we fit a three-dimensional world onto a two-dimensional canvas? Answering this question will change the way you look at the world, literally: we'll learn where to stand as we view a painting so it pops off that two-dimensional canvas seemingly out into our three-dimensional space. In this talk, we'll explore the mathematics behind perspective paintings, which starts with simple rules and will lead us into really lovely, really tricky puzzles. Why do artists use vanishing points? What's the difference between 1-point and 3-point perspective? Why don't your vacation pictures don't look as good as the mountains you photographed? Dust off those old similar triangles, and get ready to put them to new use in looking at art!
Friday 1pm, SB 134: In the Shadow of Desargues
Annalisa Crannell, Franklin & Marshall College
Abstract: Those of us who teach projective geometry often nod to perspective art as the spark from which projective geometry caught fire and grew. This talk looks directly at projective geometry as a tool to illuminate the workings of perspective artists. We will particularly shine the light on at Desargues' triangle theorem (which says that any pair of triangles that is perspective from a point is perspective from a line), together with an even simpler theorem (you have to see it to believe it!). Given any convoluted, complicated polygonal object, these theorems allow us to draw that object together with something that is related to it--- its shadow, reflection, or other rigid symmetries---and we'll show how this works.
Friday Banquet, UCCU Center, Presidential South, Revisiting Familiar Places: What I Learned at the Magazine
Paul Zorn, St. Olaf College
Abstract: Among the perks of editing Mathematics Magazine, as I did from 1995 to 2000, was the chance to see and learn an enormous variety of mathematics. Much of it was familiar, but a surprising amount was new, or different. Can there possibly be anything new to learn about cubic polynomials? Countable sets? Equilateral triangles? Bijective functions?
The short answer is yes, and I'll give some examples that worked for me. The Magazine and other MAA journals are rich sources of novel --- and often surprising --- views of supposedly familiar and thoroughly understood topics from undergraduate mathematics. That such examples exist testifies the depth and richness of our subject, including at the undergraduate level.
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