Poetry with Ruler and Compass – Selected Works from the Arithmeum Collection

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With ruler and compass one can draw many mathematically well defined geometric forms. These are clear, strict and uniquely defined. Artists utilize these forms time and again – often ornamentally, sometimes placed individually. In the latter case these basic geometric forms reach beyond themselves. They stand in relation to other forms and are connected optically with them through color and composition. The viewer can discover playful connections in the pictorial compositions and see circles, quadrilaterals and triangles in a new light. As the words of a poem no longer stand alone, reaching further and inspiring the reader’s imagination, so do the forms depicted in a geometric constructivist work of art become metaphors and, like a poem, encourage the viewer to analyse as well as to dream.

Verena Loewensberg, untitled, 1971, oil on canvas, 121x80 cm, collection Arithmeum, Arith. 1272.