Miscellaneous Polyhedral Art

    This page collects a few images which feature polyhedra in graphic art.  Many come from works on perspective, where polyhedra are used as examples.

    First is a 1549 representation of the five Platonic solids by the German graphic artist Augustin Herschvogel (1503-1553).  The solid-edge form imitates Leonardo's drawings in Pacioli's Divine Proportion.  It is interesting because it appears to associate the Platonic solids with the four ancient elements of Earth, Air, Fire, and Water in a different manner than Plato.  I know of no other place where this is done:


    Next is a sculptural fantasy by Lorenz Stoer, from his Geometria et Perspectiva (1567).  I am quite impressed by the freeform construction at the right, which could easily pass for a 20th century sculpture:

    This next image is the title page of Hans Lencker's Perspectiva (1571):


    And finally, a perspective drawing of a rhombicuboctahedron with pyramids attached to each face, with shadows.  It is from Paul Heinecken's Lucidum Prospectivae Speculum (1727):

    For a thorough history of perspective, see Martin Kemp's The Science of Art (1990) from which some of the above images were scanned.  Others were scanned from the article by Tomlow listed in the references.

    Virtual Polyhedra, (c) 1998, George W. Hart