Infinite Measure
Learning to Design in Geometric Harmony with Art, Architecture, and Nature
Published on 1. May 2013
Book
Paperback/Softback
400 pages
978-1-938086-02-1 (ISBN)
Description
Infinite Measure is both a creative workbook and an authoritative reference guide for teachers, students, and practitioners of design, including architecture, interior design, landscape architecture, painting, sculpture, the graphic arts, theater and stage design, and even musical instruments and crafts. Taking pages from books of nature, art, and architecture, Fletcher provides visual designers of all art forms and disciplines with geometric methods for composing harmonious spaces and places.
Fletcher shares her professional knowledge and experience by offering practical techniques for design applications, including step-by-step elementary and advanced drawings for producing proportional schemes with a compass and rule; commentaries on geometric symbols and useful theorems; definitions; and etymologies of essential mathematical terms. A highlight of the book are Fletcher's original studies that analyze harmonious proportions in world-famous art, architecture, landscape design, and other compositions. These include the South Rose Window at Cathedrale Notre Dame de Paris, Andrea Palladio's Villa Emo and Teatro Olimpico, a Stradivari violin, Thomas Jefferson's Poplar Forest, Beatrix Farrand's garden courtyard for the Oriental Institute at the University of Chicago, the illuminated Lindisfarne Gospels, a Louis Sullivan stencil for the Chicago Stock Exchange, and Eero Saarinen's North Christian Church.
The desire for harmony is universal among all cultures. In Infinite Measure, we rediscover a fundamental starting point for designers of all ages and skills: the simple act of drawing with a compass and rule-as Frank Lloyd Wright famously taught his architecture apprentices at Taliesin and Taliesin West-can sensitize the designer to the rich subtleties of spatial harmony and proportion, no matter how one ultimately chooses to express it.
Fletcher shares her professional knowledge and experience by offering practical techniques for design applications, including step-by-step elementary and advanced drawings for producing proportional schemes with a compass and rule; commentaries on geometric symbols and useful theorems; definitions; and etymologies of essential mathematical terms. A highlight of the book are Fletcher's original studies that analyze harmonious proportions in world-famous art, architecture, landscape design, and other compositions. These include the South Rose Window at Cathedrale Notre Dame de Paris, Andrea Palladio's Villa Emo and Teatro Olimpico, a Stradivari violin, Thomas Jefferson's Poplar Forest, Beatrix Farrand's garden courtyard for the Oriental Institute at the University of Chicago, the illuminated Lindisfarne Gospels, a Louis Sullivan stencil for the Chicago Stock Exchange, and Eero Saarinen's North Christian Church.
The desire for harmony is universal among all cultures. In Infinite Measure, we rediscover a fundamental starting point for designers of all ages and skills: the simple act of drawing with a compass and rule-as Frank Lloyd Wright famously taught his architecture apprentices at Taliesin and Taliesin West-can sensitize the designer to the rich subtleties of spatial harmony and proportion, no matter how one ultimately chooses to express it.
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
VA
United States
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Dimensions
Height: 254 mm
Width: 204 mm
ISBN-13
978-1-938086-02-1 (9781938086021)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Person
Rachel Fletcher was born in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1947 and was raised there. She began her career in lighting and stage design for the theater with degrees from Hofstra University (B.A. in theater arts), SUNY Albany (M.A. in dramatic literature), and Humboldt State University (M.F.A. in lighting/stage design). She has been a faculty member of the New York School of Interior Design since 1996 and a contributing editor to the Nexus Network Journal since 2005. Her professional work designing theatrical spaces led to an interest in the principles of geometric proportion and harmony as a design system, including time as a geometer and teacher of geometry and proportion for school-age children and adult professionals and at dozens of universities, museums, and institutions in the United States and Europe. In this capacity, she received an International Center for Jefferson Studies Fellowship Award from the Thomas Jefferson Foundation to study geometric proportions in Jefferson's architectural works. Fletcher was the creator/curator of the museum exhibits "Infinite Measure," "Design by Nature," and "Harmony by Design: The Golden Mean" and the author of the latter's exhibit catalog. As a community activist, she is the founding director of the Housatonic River Walk in her home town of Great Barrington, Massachusetts, which was designated a National Recreation Trail by the National Park Service in 2009, and the co-director of the Upper Housatonic Valley African-American Heritage Trail. For her significant contributions to conservation and civic improvements, she has received an Environmental Merit Award from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, citations from the Garden Club of America, and the National Urban Hometown River Award in Grassroots Activism from American Rivers, among other honors.