Quinn: Sierpinski triangle in Dali

Okay, so I've got more than a passing interest in mathematics, and since I know at least Brandon shares this interest, I thought I'd post a Dali painting, Visage of War, which I see as an artistic implementation of some mathematical ideas.


One intriguing aspect of this painting is infinite regress: each face in this picture contains three smaller copies of itself. This self-referentiality ensures that the chain of faces has no bottom level. Just as there is no bottom to the horrors of war. It's a very thoughtful painting. In any case, the abstract structure is very similar to the Sierpinski gasket, a fractal with the property that it contains three copies of itself and some empty space.

By the way, I just stumbled upon that painting this afternoon, when I discovered mathpaint.blogspot.com. (The mathematical commentary on that blog tends not to be totally correct, but some of the images are very striking.)

Q