Activity: Escher Exhibition (4 ESO)

Mathematics and History Departments

Before visiting Escher Exhibition: Escher and Topology1

Escher was very interested in visual aspects of Topology, a branch of mathematics just coming into full flower during his lifetime. The Mbius strip is perhaps the prime example, and Escher made many representations of it. It has the curious property that it has only one side, and one edge. Thus, if you trace the path of the ants in Mbius Strip II, you will discover that they are not walking on opposite sides of the strip at all they are all walking on the same side.

Eschers Topological Images

Balcony

Print Gallery

Mbius Strip II

Print Gallery, (grid-paper sketch)

This activity has been developed using different materials selected from the following bibliographic sources: http://www.mathacademy.com/pr/minitext/escher/index.asp AAVV, A Survey of Mathematics with Applications, Eighth Edition (Pearson Education, 2009)

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Activity: Escher Exhibition (4 ESO)

Mathematics and History Departments

Another very remarkable lithograph, called Print Gallery, explores both the logic and the topology of space. Here a young man in an art gallery is looking at a print of a seaside town with a shop along the docks, and in the shop is an art gallery, with a young man looking at a print of a seaside town . . . but wait! What's happened?

All of Escher's works reward a prolonged stare, but this one does especially. Somehow, Escher has turned space back into itself, so that the young man is both inside the picture and outside of it simultaneously. The secret of its making can be rendered somewhat less obscure by examining the grid-paper sketch the artist made in preparation for this lithograph. Note how the scale of the grid grows continuously in a clockwise direction. And note especially what this trick entails: A hole in the middle. A mathematician would call this a singularity, a place where the fabric of the space no longer holds together. There is just no way to knit this bizarre space into a seamless whole, and Escher, rather than try to obscure it in some way, has put his trademark initials smack in the center of it. As we have seen Escher was very interested in Topology. Now we will try to clarify the meaning of this branch of mathematics.

Topological Equivalence
Someone once said that topologist is a person who does not know the difference between a doughnut and a coffee cup. Two geometric figures are said to be topologically equivalent if one figure can be elastically twisted (torcida), stretched (estirada), bent (doblada), or shrunk (encogida) into the other figure without puncturing (perforar) or ripping (rasgar) the original figure. If a doughnut is made of elastic material, it can be stretched, twisted, bent, shrunk, and distorted until it resembles a coffee cup with a handle, as shown in the picture below.

In topology, figures are classified according to their genus. The genus of an object is determined by the number of holes that go through the
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Activity: Escher Exhibition (4 ESO)

Mathematics and History Departments

object. A cup and a doughnut each have one hole and are of genus 1 (and are therefore topologically equivalent). Notice that the cup handle is considered a hole, whereas the opening at the rim of the cup (borde de la taza) is not considered a hole. The following chart illustrates the genus of several objects.

Marble. Genus 0

Doughnut. Genus 1

Strainer. Genus 3 or more.

Bowling ball. Genus 0

Coffee cup. Genus 1

Kettle. Genus 2

Scissors. Genus 2

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Activity: Escher Exhibition (4 ESO)

Mathematics and History Departments

Activities 1:
Give the name and the genus of the following objects. If the object has a genus larger than 5, write larger than 5.

ame: Genus:

ame: Genus:

ame: Genus:

ame: Genus:

ame: Genus:

ame: Genus:

ame: Genus:

ame: Genus:

ame: Genus:

Activity 2: Jordan Curves

A Jordan Curve is a topological object that can be thought of as a circle twisted out of shape. Like a circle, it has an inside and an outside. To get from one side to the other, at least one line must be crossed. Consider the following Jordan curve; are points A and B inside or outside the curve? Could you establish a general rule to know whether a point is inside or outside the Jordan curve?

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Activity: Escher Exhibition (4 ESO)

Mathematics and History Departments

Activity 3: Mbius Strip

If you place a pencil on one surface of a sheet of paper and do not remove it from the sheet, you must across the edge to get to the other surface. Thus, a sheet of paper has one edge and two surfaces. The sheet retains these properties even when crumpled into a ball. The Mbius strip, also called a Mbius band, is a one-sided, one-edged surface. You can construct one by: a) Taking a strip of paper

b) Giving one end a half twist

c) Taping the ends together

The Mbius strip has some very interesting properties. To better understand these properties, perform the following experiments.

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Activity: Escher Exhibition (4 ESO)

Mathematics and History Departments

Experiment 1: Take a sheet of paper, a strip of paper and construct a paper ring as shown in the picture.

Could you tell how many edges and how many sides these different surfaces have?

Surface Sheet of paper Strip of paper Ring of paper Hints:

Number of edges

Number of sides

How to count the edges: Start coloring an edge at one point with your felt-tip pen, if you color the entire edge and never have to lift the pen from the paper then the paper has one edge. A pointy vertex does not divide an edge into two parts. How to count the sides: Start coloring one side, fill it with color but don't cross over any sharp edges. When you are done, one side will be colored the other will not. So, the strip has 2 sides. A simpler way to test for the number of sides is to draw a line along one side. If any point can be reached from the line without crossing an edge then that point is on the same side as the line. Draw a line on one side of the paper, points on the other side cannot be reached without crossing an edge, this means the paper has two sides.

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Activity: Escher Exhibition (4 ESO)

Mathematics and History Departments

Experiment 2: Make a Mbius strip using a strip of paper and tape as illustrated above. Check a Mbius band is a one-sided, one-edged surface. Experiment 3: Make a Mbius strip. Use scissors to make a small slit in the middle of the strip. Starting at the slit, cut along the strip, keeping the scissors in the middle of the strip. Continue cutting and observe what happens.

Experiment 4: Make a Mbius strip. Make a small slit at a point about one-third of the width of the strip. Cut along the strip, keeping the scissors the same distance from the edge. Continue cutting and observe what happens.

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