Maths & Aesthetics

If I’m being completely honest with myself and I hope you are too, consciously or unconsciously we all seem to derive pleasure from aesthetics. We like to admire pretty and beautiful sights and sounds, whether it is a part of nature, art, architecture or music. Let’s face it, we love aesthetics. We appreciate beauty, it is a part and parcel of existence, it drives a few towards indulging in the formation of beautiful works and the rest sit in awe and admiration of these so-called beautiful sights/sounds. A few of us are biased towards a certain type of aesthetic, because well, we all may be the same down to the fabric but really we all have our own opinions and preferences too. I for one believe that despite people’s personal preferences, there are things present all around us that commonly influence the way we perceive and like things, a general guideline of sorts. a midpoint for it to appeal to humans. If I had to put this into an example, the easiest one that all humans could find appealing would be the colours, the cloud formations at the time of a sunset or a sunrise, right? It’s breath-taking. Well, what if I told you that there was a certain element that could affect the aesthetics of an object to make it pleasurable to the human eye but for the majority of the human demography. Believe it or not, there apparently is an element - The Golden Ratio or The Divine Proportion along with the Fibonacci Sequence. And before you write it off as just another mathematical concept, it’s literally the key to what you find beautiful around you.

Wait, stay with me a little longer. Take it from someone who has failed 12 out of 13 math papers in his academic life. This Golden Ratio or The Divine Proportion or The Golden Section or The Golden Mean, call it what you want. You will be taken aback by it, once you finish reading what i have to tell you about it.

We humans have a tendency to observe the tiniest of details and analyse the littlest things. Yes, that's exactly why humans know so much and have come so far. Regardless, from the Ancient Greeks, to the Mayans, to the Egyptians, we’ve come to see in several studies that the Golden Ratio was present in their architecture, their art and so on.

If we go a little ahead in time, even famous renowned artists like Da Vinci, Michelangelo and Salvador Dali have employed the element of Golden Ratio in their art.

Not convinced? Well for a more recent example, the Apple logo also abides by the Golden Ratio.

More bragging rights for The Golden Ratio would be the acknowledgement of this concept by personalities like - Aristotle & Pythagoras.

Moving on -

You’ll see an image on the right of this text, for which if you are a math enthusiast you will understand, but for the rest like me, will be extremely confused. It took me a week to actually get it.

First of all, let's get acquainted with the Fibonacci Sequence. I hope you brought your level A mental maths to this blog entry, because it’s time for you to use it now. The Fibonacci Sequence starts with 0 and 1. You then take those two, and add them together, and add that to the sequence. The sequence is now 0 1 1. Each new number is the previous two numbers, added together. So the sequence goes 0 1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34 etc. Very simply put, each digit is the sum of the two numbers before it.

Now why would someone want to know about this Fibonacci Sequence? It’s just addition, we’ve been doing it for years, well really there’s no reason. It’s just really interesting when you see this applied in the environment around you. Almost next to all flowers and intact petals, you will find that these petals are all in Fibonacci Numbers.

Approximately equal to a 1:1.61 ratio, the Golden Ratio can be illustrated using a Golden

Rectangle. This is a rectangle where, if you cut off a square (side length equal to the shortest side of the rectangle), the rectangle that's left will have the same proportions as the original rectangle.

So if you remove the left-hand square from the rectangle above, you'll be left with another, smaller Golden Rectangle. This could continue infinitely. Similarly, adding a square equal to the length of the longest side of the rectangle gets you increasingly closer to a Golden Rectangle and the Golden Ratio.

Most people think Mathematics is this cumbersome and tough to take in: a bundle of concepts, but in actuality it’s just a silly imaginary subject created by humans to try and understand the wondrous universe around them. It takes a little effort, but if you’re willing to understand how things work and how they might apply to you it results in the expansion of your mind.

The thing about the Golden Ratio is that it's the ultimate tool to help you create something that establishes the right emotional and visual tone with people who interact with your work. This theory exists whether designers or artists as a whole apply it intentionally or not. So what matters is that you take note of its existence and appreciate the fact that it's subliminally all around you.

What the golden ratio does is direct your eyes to certain areas artists want you to focus on or look at, and that’s where its beauty lies. Your brain is simply hardwired to take notice and look at it. It helps create balance and scale, even when not wholly intentional it always improves whatever it's used in.

So you got this far? Let me introduce to you my first! co-writer! I have had many names, but the one I use now is Aditya Udupa.

I'm not no one. I am the Madman, exploring the universe and trying to decipher its mysteries while investigating its intricacies. I have taken on the form of a 19-year-old boy, who loves to write. Plunging myself into the art of poetry, I wish to spread my thoughts and ideas across this dimension. I love a whole range of movies, music, and books; all of which inspire me to be more than what I can be. I draw, paint and a whole slew of other things. I'm studying in university right now, and I would love it if you connect with my work and support me. My blog - https://ramblingmadman.in/