SCIENCE + ART: In addition to writing, Margaret creates projects at the interface of science & art. In 2003, with her twin-sister Christine, she established the Institute For Figuring, a Los Angeles based practice devoted to “the poetic and aesthetic dimensions of science and mathematics.” At the core of this endeavor is a belief that ideas which are usually presented in symbolic form (through equations and textbooks), can often be engaged via material play. Hyperbolic geometry can be crocheted; fractals can be folded from business cards; and seemingly impossible topologically forms can be woven out of paper. Over the past 20 years, the Wertheims have created science-based exhibits and events for museums and galleries worldwide, including Hayward Gallery (London), Machine Project (Los Angeles), Art Center College of Design (Pasadena), University of Southern California (Los Angeles), and MASS MoCA (North Adams, MA). Their Crochet Coral Reef project is now the largest participatory art & science endeavor in the world with over 25,000 participants in 52 cities and countries. Through an unlikely conjunction of mathematics, marine biology, handicraft, and community practice, the Crochet Reef engages audiences with non-Euclidean geometry while drawing attention to climate change and its devastating effect on marine life. The Reef has been exhibited internationally, including at the Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum (NYC), Museum of Arts and Design (NYC), Science Gallery (Dublin), the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History (Washington D.C.); in Finland at the Helsinki Biennial; in Germany at Museum Frieder Burda and here; in Austria at Schlossmuseum Linz and here; and at the 2019 Venice Biennale.
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