Customer Reviews (1)

The Graphic Work of a one of kind artist.
M.C. Escher, make many contributions to the art and math-related sciences. This awesome book, a must-have relic, shows, the graphic work of this artist, showing us, the complexity and mistery of many of his works, from his popular "Metamorphosis" series to it's "impossiblepaintings", like "Waterfalls" or "Concave andConvex". The quallity of the illsutrations and content is excellent.This is, a must-have book, for any artist, graphic designer, scientist, orpeople, interested on contemporary, and impressive art. ... Read more

Product Description

Softcover printing of a popular title (h/c sold over 400 copies in North America) at a price that will make it accessible to a much wider audience

Richly illustrated with original art works in addition to well-known and little-known works by Escher

A CD-ROM complements the articles, containing color illustrations of work by contemporary artists, movies, animations, and other demonstrations

Product Description
An exhibit of the work of the Dutch artist M. C. Escher is being held in Cambridge, Massachusetts, home to amateur sleuths Homer and Mary Kelly and their friend Leonard Sheldrake. At the exhibit, Leonard, an avid Escher fan, falls instantly in love with a woman in a green coat who is equally enthralled by Escher's brilliance. To Leonard's dismay, she hurriedly leaves the exhibit, hinting to him that if he knew her better, he would not love her. Homer and Mary offer to help a now desperate Leonard find the woman but end up in an Escher-like labyrinth of their own. Enhanced with Escher illustrations throughout, Langton creates a world where every line, curve, and angle lead to murder. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (7)

"...Wandering around in enigmas"
This book is the sixteenth 'Homer Kelly' mystery, published in 1992, and is another charmingly offbeat journey through Cambridge, Massachusetts, this time concentrating on the Mount Auburn Cemetery and an exhibition of the twentieth-century Dutch artist Maurits Escher.

Like many of the creatures in an Escher print, the characters in this book metamorphose into one another, one via plastic surgery and another by some kind of mysterious metaphysics.

Unfortunately, although I enjoyed the book and the usual antics of Homer and his wife, Mary, I couldn't quite develop a relationship with one of the main characters:the little old landlady who pays daily visits to her deceased husband in Mount Auburn Cemetery.The author resorts to having people fall in love with Eloise Winthrop because of her beautiful smile (very sloppy, Jane).

However, the mysterious and villainous woman in the green coat who lies on her son's grave in Mount Auburn Cemetery, and sends him letters via a metal box, more than makes up for the bland landlady.She is truly spooky.Wait till you find out how her two-year-old son died.

There are many fatal symmetries in the plot, which kicks off when two people fall instantaneously in love with each other at an exhibition of the work of M.C. Escher.They drift together in front of his wood-engraving called 'A Dream.' (A sleeping or dead bishop with a praying mantis on his chest).Leonard, a crystallographer loses track of his new love, Frieda as she suddenly bolts out of the exhibition, wearing a green coat.

Actually, two women in identical green coats leave the Escher exhibition together.They look very much alike, but can be differentiated by their actions.One tries to hide from the other, who proceeds to roll an old man down the stairs at a nursing home, and heave a geologist named Leonard out of a tower in Mount Auburn Cemetery, killing both of the men.

Leonard, the crystallographer starts to metamorphose into Leonard, the deceased geologist. His hair begins to form a part on the wrong side of his head.He starts to see silent funeral processions at the cemetery, where his landlady visits her dead husband.

It is interesting to watch the author weave her physical and metaphysical plot lines together, using Escher's prints and quotations as a constant theme.In her afterword, Langton quotes Albert Flocon concerning Escher:"His work teaches us that the most perfect surrealism is latent in reality..."

That's a good description of the structure of this intriguing murder mystery.

Based on the drawings of M C Escher
The Escher Twist is lots of fun for anyone who enjoys the drawings of M C Escher. This Boston-based murder mystery is illustrated throughout by reproductions of his art work, including those persistent ants on their twisted band of paper.

Like Escher's parade of ants on the Möbius strip, the characters march around and around and end up back where they started. Like Escher's "Birds and Fish", The plot has repeating patterns that change subtly over time until they turn into something quite different. The images in Escher's "Reflecting Sphere" become Doppelgänger. (How many women in green coats? How many shy Leonards?) Most dramatically, there are the stark contrasts of dark and light: Here is love and hate; joy and tragedy; kindness and malevolence.

The husband and wife detective pair of Homer and Mary Kelly struggle to relate the people in torn pieces of family photographs. Which is up and which down? Who is parent and who child?And just as the puzzle pieces begin to fit, the pattern breaks up again like a surreal dream.By the way, just in case you rushed to read the book without checking its cover, count carefully how many pillars there are in the pagoda.

A Lovely Math Mystery
First off, I have never read Jane Langton before.I picked this book up from the New Mysteries section of my local library, based entirely on its intriguing cover (yes, I judged the book based on its cover).

Having never read Jane Langton before, I knew only what the back of the book stated.After reading it, I am ready to rush out and find more of her books.

I give this book five stars because it grabbed me.And it grabbed me right away.The characters were fascinating from the get-go, especially the way they were introduced.I have never been to Cambridge, but I felt that Langton painted the town with vibrant yet surreal colors.

In addition, this book contained a lot of math concepts that I did not know about before, but were presented in such a way as to not seem confusing or above my head.In fact, I had to make my own Moebius Strip just to see for myself how wonderful they are.The theme was well carried in this book.Big thumbs up!A mystery like no other I have read.Cannot wait to read another one.

Not her best effort
I am a big fan of Jane Langton's, having read all but two of her earlier Homer Kelly mysteries (no longer in print). I have to say that while this book is better than most mysteries being sold today, it is not great in comparison with her earlier efforts.
In this entry, Homer & Mary Kelly set out to help a man, Leonard Sheldrake, find a woman with whom he has fallen in love (at first sight while at an Escher exhibition in a museum). The woman is not easy to find as she is attempting to avoid one of her relatives, a woman set on vengeance for the death of her baby.
The plot of this book is not as complicated as others by Ms. Langton but still was sometimes a bit confusing for me, particularly with regards to some torn up photographs found by Leonard. I had to read the paragraphs describing the pictures a couple of times to get the images straight in my mind and even then I am not for sure that I had it all correct.
But, when all is said and done, this is a good book and I would recommend it to anyone, particularly if they are already familiar with the series.

"The Escher Twist" Winds Around an Artful Plot
It doesn't take long to figure out that Jane Langton's use of Escher prints provides creative foreshadowing in "The Escher Twist." Just like the Escher prints used throughout the book, you're not sure if you are seeing what you think you are seeing. The characters in this delightful story ramble through the plot at a relaxed, though never dull, pace. The main characters' child-like views of the world are just innocent enough to be charming without drifting over the "Dumb and Dumber" fault line. "The Escher Twist" winds down to a tidy and satisfying conclusion. ... Read more

Product Description
A study of the life and works of M.C. Escher. It shows many of the sketches, studies and diagrams which he made while creating his magical effects. His contribution to our understanding of perception and what we regard as possible or impossible is discussed and explained in this book. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Great book about MC Escher
Probably the best book written about dutch graphic artist MC Escher (by Bruno Ernst, an admirer of Escher that would become a close friend). Not only the book contains a great deal of graphic material, but there are also details about Escher's life not known elsewhere. The books covers a great deal about his early life, his travels to Italy in the 1920s, his life there, his exile into Switzerland after the fascists imposed uniforms on his children, his return to the Netherlands right before the Second World War. Remarkably, this artist revered by mathematicians for his representations of different types of symmetry and mathematical concepts, knew little math himself. He was a rather introverted artist, who had an ambivalent opinion about his own work. ... Read more

Product Description
For the artist Escher, the skin of the visible world was a piece of cloth that could be cut, folded, shaped, and rearranged in many ways. This title presents many of Esher's greatest works, from the great master prints to numerous previously unpublished drawings, and arranges them to form a cinematic journey of discovery. His preparatory sketches and jottings, which give insights into the working processes of his mind are also included.Amazon.com Review
M.C. Escher, the artist who lived from 1898 to 1972, suffers from horrible overexposure. Who hasn't seen the college dorm room posters, postcards, T-shirts, and coffee mugs of such well-worn images as a hand drawing another hand or gothic buildings with never-ending staircases? The mass reproduction of these images has carved a firm place in our popular culture, yet made the work dismissible as modern art. Beyond the familiar images, though, is an immense body of work. The Magic of M.C. Escher covers in depth the graphic illustrations, woodcuts, and lithographs of Escher's career. The artist has always attracted the attention of scientists, mathematicians, and teenage boys everywhere; the popular 1980s game Dungeons & Dragons seems to borrow heavily from the systematic yet mystical quality of his drawing style. With his amazingly repetitive graphic illustration and unflinchingly control of size, shape, and shading, Escher draws like a human computer. One can only wonder what he might have done with today's graphic tools.

The book itself is creatively put together, with foldouts, seemingly endless images, and a loving introduction by the director of the Gemeentemuseum in the Hague. The minimal text selections that appear throughout are quotes from Escher himself, many taken from letters to family members. These personal musings give candid insight into what he thought about his peers, his career, and his work: "I really do feel these days like a kind of 'specialist,' and I don't want to 'depend' on my specialty alone, but I also feel it to be my duty to devote myself to that as much as possible." This remarkable book is a wonderful opportunity to enjoy the astounding work of the man who could create two-dimensional origami with a pencil. --J.P. Cohen ... Read more

Customer Reviews (9)

Awesome is an under statment
This book has everything an Escher fan could want, Big beautiful vibrant photos and lots of them.

This Escher book is a Labor of Love
Almost cinematic in design and construction, truly, "The Magic of M.C. Escher" is a breakthrough book on the works of this artist. Every page is filled with inspiration and surprise. Designed by a gifted art director named Erik The' and produced by Andreas Landshoff, this book flows together to form a loving catalogue of Mr. Escher's visions. It is unlike other books based on Escher which tend to be either tutorial or biographical in nature. Whereas these past books, more or less, deconstruct and analyze his works mainly through words, "The Magic of M.C. Escher" successfully accomplishes this through the images themselves, revelling in their sheer beauty, from his preliminary studies all the way to the finished prints. There are many double foldout pages to better impact Escher's mastery of his craft. Some of the pages are filled, corner to corner, with extremely detailed, magnified sections of specific works that allow the reader to closely experience what it's like to be "nose to nose" with the actual prints.

This book catapults the reader into Escher's world immediately. Before you even open the title page, you discover that the inside of the dust cover reproduces, in full color, of course, "Metamorphosis III" in three horizontal panels each measuring an astounding 39" across. This book brings us along on a visual journey ajoined by Escher's own words, as if he is personally giving us insights on a guided tour of his works. It thoughtfully limits itself to short excerpts from Escher's lectures and letters whose sole purpose is to compliment glorious, detailed photographs of original work. It's filled with Escher's never-before published pencil studies and sketches, extreme closeups of his prints, and detailed photographs of his original carved wood blocks. The pencil studies from his notebooks allow us to follow his thought processes and fully appreciate the endless hours he joyfully and dutifully spent on formulating the precise combination of graphic elements to arrive at his finished images.

The book makes side-by-side visual comparisons of earlier works that inspired Escher to create more self-satisfying images that better convey his "relative division of the plane" and other spacial concepts. Most of its visual content were supplied by two sources: The M.C.Escher Foundation and Michael Sachs, a private collector and print dealer from Connecticut.

Overall, this is book is a stunning, loving homage to this master of printmaking and genius to the graphic arts. Nothing is spared in this book's construction and design. If the adage is true that a picture is worth a thousand words, "The Magic of M.C.Escher" could fill a library.

Magic of M.C. Escher
Wonderful coffee-table book of Escher's best drawing illusions.Even the jackets is two-sided and imaginatively done with style.

M-escher-merizing!
Given as a gift by a special friend of mine, the book has always adorned the coffee table in the living room as a centerpiece that never fails to attract the attention of both art lovers and art dabblers alike. Perhaps it could be said that my interest in the two seemingly disparate field of mathematics and art motivated that friend of mine to purchase the book, as Escher himself apparently believed and proved that those two seemingly unrelated fields could be beautifully synthesized in a brilliant fusion of creativity. The result is more than convincing.

Outstanding!
Escher was a Dutch wanna-be mathematician, who expressed himself through incredibly intricate, creative works of art.This book contains hundreds of his drawing as well as his notebook sketches, which is interesting to look at because you get to see how he developed his drawings.Accompanying most of the pictures in this book are excerpts of letters that he wrote to various people.If you want a book on Escher's work, then this is the one to buy!Fantastic. ... Read more

Product Description
The work of Dutch artist Maurits Cornelis Escher (1898-1972) continues to attract wide interest. Mathematicians, physicists, crystallographers, chemists, biologists, psychologists, psychiatrists, art historians, and specialists in computer graphics and visual communications attended this congress. The papers presented here in this illustrated volume confirm that Escher's works are not only good examples of the visualization of scientific problems but also stimulate real scientific research. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

The Price does not Justify the Return
While I'm sure at the time of this conference, the works in this book were a bit more groundbreaking, there is little in the book that is outside the realm of modern mathematical models of symmetry and symmetry breaking.

It is fantastic, mind you.And it's nice to read some of these authors in their own 'speech' - for it is obvious that many of the papers collected were delivered to a crowd as part of a presentation. Therefore much of this collection is a messy copy of many unedited (spelling/sentence errors) and hand written notes.

It's great.But, I don't know that there is any work from this conference that was not published later, and, since that is the case, much of this is really available for free on-line at this point. There are some nice hand written black& white pictures by Penrose, but... for $70-100 dollars?

I wouldn't recommend this for an Escher fan, certainly, and only the most die-hard of math fans. ... Read more

Product Description
Doris Schattschneider's classic M. C. Escher: Visions of Symmetry (1990) is the most penetrating study of Escher's work in existence, and the one most admired by mathematicians and scientists. It deals with one powerful obsession that preoccupied Escher: what he called "the regular division of the plane," the puzzle-like interlocking of birds, fish, lizards, and other natural forms in continuous patterns. Schattschneider asks, "How did he do it?" She answers the question by meticulously analyzing Escher's notebooks, and the New Scientist described the result as "a collection of detective stories whose plots are brilliantly organized patterns."

Like the first edition of the book, this new volume includes many of Escher's masterworks, as well as hundreds of lesser-known examples of his work. It also features an illustrated epilogue by the author that reveals new information about Escher's inspiration and shows how his ideas of symmetry have influenced mathematicians, computer scientists, and contemporary artists. Visions of Symmetry is a trip into the mind of a creator who continues to captivate the world. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (4)

Excellent resource; bueatiful reproductions
This is a very in-depth examination of Esher's work, including the mathematics behind his symmetries. This book is a must for Escher fans. If you aren't a fan, this book may make you one.

Interesting book, very complete collection of work
I bought this book for a college math course.This book would be equally good for math or art students.It is full of historical, chronological information and also covers how the artist's methods are in use today and are being further explored and appreciated.This is also a 100% complete collection of the artist's (very extensive) work.

Not for the casual Escher fan.
Make no mistake. This isn't a comprehensive book for the Escher fan who wants to look at all his pretty pictures. It is a highly academic (no problem there, unless you're looking for, like I said, pretty pictures) book that focuses on basic patterns. It doesn't have many of the drawings that introduced me to his work in the first place. It's not the coffee-table book I was looking for, but that's my problem. It does have volumes of text for the so-inclined.

A Most Comprehensive Study of M. C. Escher's Works.
It is most gratifying to note that at large, it is a professor of Mathematics who was inspired to collect the materials and compile this most penetrating study on the works of M. C. Escher.That professor is Dr. Doris Schattschneider and her latest publication "M. C. Escher : Visions of Symmetry" is a life's labour of love at collecting, classifying and indexing the works of M. C. Escher in a single volume.The book opens with a stunning photograph of M. C. Escher and a penetrating one-page foreword by Douglas R. Hofstadter.

Who then is M. C. Escher and what is his global appeal?Maurits Cornelis Escher (1898-1972) was a Dutch graphic and wood-cut artist, who for decades working in isolation, single handedly produced the most haunting, fascinating and intriguing works of tesselation, the kind, the world had not seen before.His obsession with visual patterns built by the intricate interlocking of shapes that repeat and repeat forever, filling every crack in the regular plane, made it almost into a visual poetry.What is remarkable is that an artist single handedly learned by himself, the mathematical laws of the plane symmetry group including all it's isometries (i.e. translations, rotations, reflections and glide reflections) as he produced year after year patterns with interlocking shapes of unmatched beauty and provocation.He saw symmetry and beauty where others saw only a senseless repetiton.One can spend hours describing the various feelings brought out by a single image, suffice to say it would require a multi volume encyclopedia to describe in detail all that is collected in this single tome.I am flabbergasted that this book sells on the internet for as low as US $11.00.It is worth it's weight in precious diamonds. Thanks a million Doris, for doing such amicable justice to a great artist, and for providing us such a timeless treasure. ... Read more

Product Description
The only book to combine illustrations of M.C. Escher's notebooks with the complete body of his symmetry drawings (180 of which were unpublished before this book). It offers a fascinating journey of discovery for Escher afficionados of all kinds, including artists, designers, historians, mathematicians, and scientists. "A study of Escher's art and thoughts and an intellectual biography of the artist."--Choice. 430 illustrations. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (4)

The definitive book on Escher's repeating pattern work.
As a child, Maurits Cornelis Escher fitted together irregular pieces of cheese in his sandwiches so that they would completely fill the space between the slices of bread.From the very beginnings of his career as anartist, in 1921, he devised ways of interlocking images so as to leave noempty space, and then of making these images repeat infinitely inincreasingly complex ways. Professor Schattschneider's magnificentlyillustrated volume analyses this critical aspect of Escher's work,focussing on a series of 137 symmetry drawings and watercolors created from1926 to 1971, which the artist kept in five folders throughout his lifetimeand which he used as references for his continuing work on the regulardivision of the plane.Included are analogies from each of these works(which now sell for tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars each) to hisoriginal prints and projects.As owner of and dealer in the main body ofEscher's original prints, drawings and watercolors, which were previouslyon loan to the Hague Museum, I make extensive use of this book and commendit to all.Some of the text is written for the layman; other portions ofthe writing are technical and will be of interest to mathematicians andcrystallographers.In addition, the quantity and quality of the full-pagecolor illustrations, few of which are to be found in any other publicationin print, contribute to making this book, which serves as a catalogueraisonné of the symmetry drawings and watercolors, eminentlycollectable.

The other key books on Escher are M.C. ESCHER: HIS LIFE ANDCOMPLETE GRAPHIC WORK; THE MAGIC MIRROR OF M.C. ESCHER; THE GRAPHIC WORK OFM.C. ESCHER; and ESCHER ON ESCHER. Persons technically inclined may also beinterested in ART AND SCIENCE, which constitutes the proceedings of the1985 Escher conference in Rome.

A must for Escher fans interested in the maths of his work
This book answered a lot of questions I had about Escher's regular division of the plane. It has highly enlarged my understanding of his work, and thus made me enjoy it even more. My initial interest was deepening mymathematical knowledge on tessallations, and I can tell I did.

An excellent example of the method to the genius
This book has beautiful full color reproductions of Escher's notebooks, along with erxplainations and diagrams showing how Escher accomplished such a volume of work. It also includes anecdotes told by his friends, andreproductions of all three of the metamorphosis. Truly Brilliant! You can'tgo wrong with this book, be you mathemetitian, or artist

A good look at Escher's tessellation research.
Doris Schattschneider's book takes a look at Escher's research on the regular division ofthe plane.

1/8 on an iceberg is visible while 7/8 is hidden. Escher's prints are like this. The visibleimage is only a smallpart of the thought and preparation that lies beneath the surface. Schattschneider takes us beneath the surface and shines a light on thishidden behemoth.

This volume is more demanding and difficult than otherEscher books. But it is rewarding todelve into.

Meticulous, tenacious,thorough, playful. My adjectives for Escher are driven home evenmoreforcefully by this book.

Ms Schattschneider did a fine job putting thisbook together. ... Read more