As I get more and more into crochet and what one can do with it I find myself learning about pretty odd things – one being The Institute of Figuring, which has an amazing section on hyperbolic space and its representations in crochet and how that can be used to represent Coral Reefs – see Margaret Wertheim’s speech at TED. What I learned today was that the piece I made for my mother at Christmas was a very banal form of what they’re teaching and making – increasing stitches in some regularity essentially changes the course or definition of a line.
To me this looks much like my amoebas and makes me think that potentially I could make mine with one single strand of yarn.
Many of them look so much like coral and on the site they show some underwater pictures of sea creatures that have hyperbolic “fringe” on their bodies – this effect is something that happens naturally, which I love. The group has created an entire crochet coral reef – the details of which I’ll post soon! It’s amazing.
This also made me realize that my very first college level fibers project was based around this very concept – I made, for the annual fashion show, a series of dresses that all had drop-waist tutus and the tutus themselves were vertical as opposed to the usual circles around the body. I found that by cutting the tutu pieces into crescents as opposed to half circles I could achieve an amazing curl to my fabric, which in tulle produced an amazing effect. I was smarter than I knew!
I love the changing colors on this one – most of the site is in single yarn colors.
If that’s not an anemone I don’t know what is. I can’t wait to sit and try to make of of these myself soon. All the how to is on the site as well as models of the progression of making one of these. Very interesting and mathy. Also of note is that the institute isn’t an actual place, its home is its website.
Tags: crochet, repetitive pattern, sculpture, textiles, weaving