Crocheting Mathematics at the UL Museum

The Hyperbolic Crochet Coral Reef is a global project created by two Americans - Margaret and Christine Wertheim from Los Angeles in order to draw public attention to how environmental pollution is endangering coral reefs and waters; the inspiration for making crochet coral reef forms began with crocheted models of hyperbolic plane discovered by Daina Taimina, Adjunct Associate Professor of Mathematics at Cornell University (she is also Professor of UL). The Latvian Reef Project was initiated by Tija Viksna, an artist who together with the teaching staff of the Children’s Art School in Mazsalaca invited students from all over Latvia to participate in the project. This year a bright masterwork of unexpected combinations and fantastic structures “From Coral Reefs to the Baltic Sea” made by 638 Latvian students, teachers and other people with a talent for crochet can be seen in many places in Latvia; now it is on exhibition at the UL Museum. Here art meets science; the large clusters of crocheted corals really excite and surprise the visitors. This summer a part of the exhibition has been displayed in Dublin, at the global exhibition of the project. Daina Taimina trying to teach students the Foundations of Geometry Neeiklida faced with computer restrictions since computers cannot describe and model hyperbolic space - frilled formation steadily expanding towards the edges. By describing mathematical formulae in schemes, Professor comprehended that these schemes resemble her crocheted designs. In 1997 the first hyperbolic crochet was invented, followed by about a hundred more. Daina Taimina’s original crocheting adventures with Mathematics are known and highly appreciated in all over the world.


Translated by students of the professional study programme Translator of the University of Latvia.