Medieval Science, The Circulation of Knowledge: Nexus & Lore
above: Lore; detail
Medieval Science, The Circulation of Knowledge: Nexus and Lore, 2015, Punctum Caecum series
In my silkscreen prints, Nexus, I feature the medieval and early modern Persian, Arab and European scientists who were inspired or influenced by each other’s scholarly research or worked on the same theories in different periods. I present these scientists’ textual works side by side to showcase the circulation of knowledge across different cultures and periods. For example, I place Alhazen’s work, the renowned 11th century Arab scientist, side by side the work of Kepler, the renowned 17th century German scientist. Although 600 years apart, Alhazen’s writings influenced Kepler’s discoveries in the field of optics.
I convert the pages of texts and diagrams of the manuscripts by these scientists into black silhouettes. Acting as a new visual language, these silhouettes present the medieval imagery through simplicity and absence of didactic textual information while offering more compositional opportunities in my work. For creating these black silhouettes, I draw inspiration from the Russian Suprematist artists El Lissitzky (1890-1941) and Kazimir Malevich (1878-1935). These artists were in search of a style of abstract painting based on geometric shapes, which they believed promoted the supremacy of pure artistic feeling over the depiction of objects. Like Suprematists’ works, my black shapes aim to engage the “pure feelings” of my audience through simplicity and visual forms. I want to explore the ways in which viewers respond to form both visually and conceptually. I utilize mainly black and white to connote our current neglect for such a vibrant flow of information that took place in medieval time.
Nexus (Averroes and Avicenna), 2015, silkscreen on paper, 30”x 22”
Above left: a page from Avicenna’s The Canon of Medicine ( Avicenna: Persian scientist, 11th c.)
Above right: a page from Averroes’ commentary on Avicenna’s The Canon of Medicine (Averroes: Andalusian philosopher and medical scientist, 12th c.)
Bottom left and right: my black silhouettes of the manuscript pages
Nexus (Newton and Khayyam), 2015, silkscreen on paper, 30”x 22”
Above left: a page from Khayyam’s manuscript on algebra (Persian scientist, 12th c.)
Above right: a page from Newton’s Principia manuscript on mathematics
Bottom left and right: my black silhouettes of the manuscript pages
Nexus (Kepler and Alhazen), 2015, silkscreen on paper, 30”x 22”
Above left: a page from Kepler’s manuscript on optics (German astronomer, 17th c.)
Above right: a page from Alhazen’s manuscript on optics (Arab scientist, 11th c.)
Bottom left and right: my black silhouettes of the manuscript pages
Nexus (Copernicus and Tusi), 2015, silkscreen on paper, 22”x 30”
Above left: a page from Tusi’s manuscript on mathematics (Persian mathematician, 13th c.)
Above right: a page from Copernicus’ manuscript on mathematics (Polish mathematician and astronomer, 16th c.)
Bottom left and right: my black silhouettes of the manuscript pages
In Lore, I display the black shapes extracted from Nexus, my silkscreen prints, in a horizontal composition using plexiglass and pins on the wall. The horizontal composition suggests a long-term flow of scientific knowledge and exchange of ideas across cultures. The color black, again, indicates our current disregard for this long-term exchange. The installation initiates what appears as an organized composition that gradually moves towards a systematic disorganization as a commentary on the loss of information, and reinterpretation of scientific concepts.
Lore, A Visual Narrative of History of Science, 2015, plexiglass and pins, 6 x 13 feet
Lore, detail
Lore and Nexus, installation view, 6 x 36 feet, solo exhibition at California State University, Stanislaus, 2016
Research
The Nexus silkscreen prints showcase appropriated versions of images from the following manuscript pages
Left: Aviccena, 11th c., Persian, a page from his manuscript on medicine, The Canon of Medicine, 15th c. edition
Right: Averroes, 12th c., Muslim, Spanish, a page from his manuscript
“The Canon of Medicine remained a medical authority for centuries. It set the standards for medicine in Medieval Europe and the Islamic world and was used as a standard medical textbook through the 18th century in Europe”
Left: Khayyam, 12th c., Persian, a page from his manuscript on algebra
Right: Newton, 17th c., English, pages from his Principia manuscript on mathematics
Left: Copernicus, 16th c., Polish, pages from his manuscript on mathematical astronomy
Right: Tusi, 13th c., Persian, a page from his manuscript on mathematics
“Since the Tusi-couple, is shown on the page above, was used by Copernicus in his reformulation of mathematical astronomy, there is a growing
consensus that he became aware of this idea in some way”
Left: Alhazen, 11th c., Arab, a page from his manuscript on optics, Kitab al-Manazir
Right: Kepler, 17th c., German, a page from his manuscript on optics
“Alhazen’s most famous work is his seven-volume treatise on optics Kitab al-Manazir (Book of Optics), written from 1011 to 1021. Alhazen studied the process of
sight, the structure of the eye, image formation in the eye, and the visual system. Alhacen’s book influenced the Perspectivists in Europe, Roger Bacon, Witelo, and Peckham. The Optics was incorporated into Risner’s 1572 printing of Opticae Thesaurus, through which Kepler finally resolved the contradictions inherent in a Ptolemaic explanation of the imaging chain, from external object to the retina of the eye”