George Hart

GEORGE W. HART, PhD

George Hart, "Dodecahedron Sculpture"

As a sculptor of constructive geometric forms, George Hart's work deals with patterns and relationships derived from classical ideals of balance and symmetry. Mathematical yet organic, these abstract forms invite the viewer to partake of the geometric aesthetic. He uses a variety of media, including paper, wood, plastic, metal, and assemblages of common household objects.
Classical forms are pushed in new directions, so viewers can take pleasure in their Platonic beauty yet recognize how they are updated for our complex high-tech times. Dr. Hart shares with many artists the idea that a pure form is a worthy object, and selects for each piece the materials that best carry that form. In one series of pieces, familiar objects are arranged in engaging configurations, displaying an essential tension between mundane individual components and the strikingly original totality.
Because his works invite contemplation, slowly revealing their content, some viewers see them as meditation objects. A lively dancing energy moves within each piece and flows out to the viewer. The integral wholeness of each self-contained sculpture presents a crystalline purity, a conundrum of complexity, and a stark simplicity.

Education

Ph.D. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, 1987
M.A. Indiana University, Linguistics, August 1979
B.S. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Mathematics, January 1977

Public Works

Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Stata Center, Cambridge, MA
London Knowledge Lab, University of London, UK
University of California at Berkeley, Computer Science Building, Berkeley, CA
Stony Brook University, Computer Science Building, Stony Brook, NY
Princeton University, Mathematics Dept., Fine Hall, Princeton, NJ
State University of New York at Oswego, Oswego, NY
Northport Public Library, Northport, NY
Long Island Museum of Science and Technology, Kings Park, NY
Goudreau Museum of Mathematics in Art and Science, New Hyde Park, NY

Awards and Honors

Artist in Residence, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
New York State Council for the Arts Individual Artists Award.

Selected Group Shows

2007 University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
2007 Tezas A&M University, College Station, TX
2007 CUNY Graduate Center, New York, NY
2007 Concordia University, Montreal, QB
2007 Ursinus College, Collegeville, PA
2007 University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC
2007 Joint MAA/AMS meeting Art Exhibit, Now Orleans, LA
2006 Polytechnic University of Valencia, Spain
2006 Newark Arts Council, Newark, NJ
2006 Princeton University, Princeton, NJ
2006 Fete de la Science, Nancy, France
2006 Susquehanna Art Museum, Harrisburg, PA
2006 Burning Man, Black Rock Desert, NV
2006 Institute of Education, University of London, London, UK
2006 Joint MAA/AMS meeting Art Exhibit, San Antonio, TX
2006 Art League of Long Island, Dix Hills, NY
2005 Mathematiques & Art Exposition, L'Institut Henri Poincare, Paris
2005 St. Mary’s College, Moraga, CA
2005 University of Colorado at Boulder, CO
2005 Joint MAA/AMS meeting Art Exhibit, Atlanta GA
2004 Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, IL
2004 Miami University, Oxford, OH
2004 DePaul University, Chicago, IL
2004 Joint Mathematics Conference Art Exhibit, Phoenix, AZ
2003 Bridges/ISAMA Exhibit, Granada, Spain
2003 Northport Museum, Northport, NY
2002 Towson College, MD
2002 Art-trium, Melville, NY
2002 Vorpal Gallery, Soho, New York City, NY
2001 Steinway Gallery, Chapel Hill, NC
2001 Northport Museum, Northport, NY
2001 Math and Art 2001, Berkshire Community College, Pittsfield , MA
2000 The Cooper Union, New York, NY
2000 Elaine Benson Gallery, Bridgehampton, NY
2000 Colloquium on Math and Arts Exhibition, Maubeuge, France
2000 University of Washington, MOSAIC conference art display, Seattle, WA
2000 International Society of Art, Math, and Architecture, Exhibition at SUNY Albany, NY
2000 Walt Whitman Birthplace Museum, Huntington, NY
2000 Fayetteville Arts Council, Fayetteville, NC
1999 b.j. Spoke Gallery, Huntington, NY
1999 Mather Hospital Annual Outdoor Sculpture Show, Port Jefferson, NY
1999 Clayton Liberatore Gallery, Bridgehampton, NY
1999 Soundview Art Gallery, Port Jefferson, NY
1998 10th Annual Juried Fine Arts Exhibit at Chelsea Center, East Norwich, NY
1998 Huntington Station Arts, Huntington, NY
1998 SOMA Gallery, Northport, NY
1998 Math and Art 1998 Exhibition, University of California at Berkeley, CA
1998 Bridges Exhibition, Southwestern College, Winfield, KS
1997 Hofstra University, Hempstead, NY
1997 Suffolk County Vanderbilt Museum, Centerport, NY
1997 Math and Art 1997 Exhibition, State University of New York at Albany, NY

Bibliography

“Symmetric Sculpture,” Journal of Mathematics and the Arts, to appear, 2007.
“Sculpture Puzzles,” Proceedings of London Bridges, London, 2006
"Mathematical Connections in Art", Math Horizons, February, 2006
"The Geometric Aesthetic," in The Visual Mind 2, Michele Emmer (ed.), MIT Press, 2005.
"Creating a Mathematical Museum on your Desk", Mathematical Intelligencer, 2005.
"Orderly Tangles Revisited", Proc. Bridges 2005: Mathematical Connections in Art, Music, and Science, Banff, 2005.
"Spaghetti Code: A Sculpture Barnraising", Proc. Art+Math=X, U. Colorado, Boulder, 2005.
"A Salamander Sculpture Barn Raising", in Visual Mathematics 7, no. 1, 2004.
"A Reconstructible Geometric Sculpture", Proceedings of ISAMA CTI 2004, DePaul Univ.
"Sculpture with Symmetrically Arranged Planar Components," Bridges/ISAMA, 2003.
"Mathematics Takes Shape," Math Horizons, April 2003.
"Solid-Segment Sculptures, "Mathematics and Art, Claude Brute ed., Springer-Verlag, 2002.
"A Color-Matching Dissection of the Rhombic Enneacontahedron", in Symmetry, 2000.
"In the Palm of Leonardo's Hand," Nexus Network Journal, 2002.
"Loopy," Humanistic Mathematics, June 2002.
Zome Geometry (with Henri Picciotto) Key Curriculum Press, 2001.
"Rapid Prototyping of Geometric Models," 13th Canadian Conf. on Comp. Geom., U. Waterloo, 2001.
"Symmetrohedra" (with Craig Kaplan) Proceedings of Bridges 2001.
"Blending Polyhedra with Overlays" (with Douglas Zongker) Proceedings Bridges 2001.
"Loopy," Humanistic Mathematics, June, 2002.
"Computational Geometry for Sculpture," ACM Conf. on Computational Geometry, Tufts University, 2001.
"Solid-Segment Sculptures," Proc. Colloq. on Math and Arts, Maubeuge, France, Sept. 2000.
"Sculpture based on Propellorized Polyhedra," in Proceedings of MOSAIC 2000, Seattle, August 2000
"Millennium Bookball," Proceedings of Bridges 2000: Mathematical Connections in Art, Music and Science, Southwestern College, Kansas, July 2000, and Visual Mathematics 2(3).
"Reticulated Geodesic Constructions," Computers and Graphics 24(6), 2000.
"Zonohedrification," The Mathematica Journal, vol. 7 no.3, 1999.
"Icosahedral Constructions," Proceedings of Bridges: Mathematical Connections in Art, Music and Science, Southwestern College, Kansas, July 1998.
"Zonish Polyhedra," Proc. of Mathematics and Design '98, San Sebastian, Spain, June, 1998.

Recent Lectures and Public Appearances

Towson University, Towson, MD, December 2006
Princeton University, NJ, November, 2006
Albion College, Albion, MI, October, 2006
State University of New York at Oswego, NY, August 2006
University of London, UK, August 2006
International Puzzle Party, Boston, July 2006
University of Puget Sound, Tacoma, WA, July 2006
St. Peter’s College, Jersey City, NJ, June 2006
Polytechnic University, New York, NY, April 2006
Fermilab, Batavia, IL, April 2006
Gathering for Gardner, Atlanta, GA, April 2006
University of Richmond, Richmond, VA, April 2006
University of Rome, Rome, Italy, March 2006
Mathematica e Cultura 2006, Venice, Italy, March 2006
Gathering for Gardner, Atlanta, GA, March 2006
Dowling College, Oakdale, NY, February 2006
Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RI, January 2006
Noguchi Museum, New York City, November 2005
Banff International Center for the Arts, Alberta, August 2005
Reed College, Portland OR, June 2005
International Conference on Science and Art, Athens, Greece, June 2005
University of Colorado at Boulder, June 2005
Western Washington University, April 2005
Long Island University, C. W. Post, NY, February 2005
Union College, Schenectady NY, January 2005
Yale University, New Haven, CT, December 2004
Goudreau Museum, New Hyde Park, NY, November 2004
University of Miami in Ohio, October 2004
Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial, Taipei, Taiwan, July 2004
Moravian College, Bethelehem, PA, April, 2004.
Gathering for Gardner, Atlanta, GA, April 2004.
University of Houston, TX, February 2004.
Massachusettes Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, October/November 2003.
MathCamp, Tacoma, WA, August, 2003.
MathFest, Boulder, CO, July 2003.
Bridges/ISAMA, Granada, Spain, July 2003.
Southwest Research Institute, San Antonio, TX, June, 2003.
University of Colorado at Colorado Springs, CO, July 2002.
New Jersey Institute of Technology, March, 2002.
Stony Brook University Distinguished Lecture, March, 2002.
Colby College, Waterville, ME, July 2001.
Southwestern College, Winfield, KS, July 2001.
American Association for the Advancement of Science, San Francisco, CA, Feb. 2001.
10th Annual Workshop on Computational Geometry, Stony Brook, 2000.
University of Waterloo, Ontario, October 2000.
State University of New York at Canton, September 2000.
University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, July 2000.
State University of New York at Stony Brook, April 2000.
University of California at Berkeley, 1999 and 1998.
Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts, Harvard University, November 1998.
New York Academy of Sciences, October 1998.
Rhode Island College, Providence, RI , 1998
MAA Mathfest, Atlanta GA, August 1997.
Art and Math Conference, State University of New York at Albany, June 1997.