This PREP workshop was made possible by the NSF grant DUE: 0341481

From Prep08Wiki

First of all, Chicago streets are a Cartesian coordinate plane:

(from [Chicago's Grid System and Street Coordinates]).

There's lots of art outside in Chicago. One is a mosaic, The Four Seasons, by Marc Chagall:

(from [Mosaic Art Source] ) Is this a tesselation? In what geometry?

Summer is time for sailing in Chicago. The mathematics is deep here: laminar flow of a fluid (air), over a turbulant layer which is over a sail, as well as the same mathematics below the waterline with water and a keel instead of air and a sail, all working together to push the sailboar forward. Too hard for this class. But I like sailing. Chicago is famous for its "El" train. Of course, being a rail line, a picture of the rails shows the stereotypic example of perspective: rail lines appearing to converge. Perspective is a very good way of introducing mathematics to artists; they understand perspective, they see it as important, and you can sneak in lots of stuff about similar triangles. From [The Elevated Loop].

Another exercise in perspective is to ponder Gustave Caillebotte's Paris Street, Rainy Day, which hangs in the Art Institute of Chicago: [The Art Institute of Chicago: Art Access]

Chicago is noted for its architecture. The building on the left is the Carson Pirie Scott buiding, designed by Louis Sullivan. What can you say about the tellelation of the windows?

The building on the right is the [Chicago Spire], which is still being built. What can you say about the symmetries of this building? More information at [http://www.thechicagospire.com/].