Each rock is a wave equation – a complex model of bifurcation and wave formation. The involutions of unstable gestures have made…
Each rock is a wave equation – a complex model of bifurcation and wave formation. The involutions of unstable gestures have made an avatar of mathematical conjecture, and like holograms of time feeling space to predict a future state, each curve in stone foresaw a future boundary state to return its figured sum. But perception, distracted by the rock’s baroque designs, may forget the secret forces that framed its final form – the tiny interferences, the micro-instabilities, and the Laplacian quests of flow regimes. Endless habits carved to stone as the tireless sculptor of the manifold weaves its liquid signals into space. Shells may store the sounds of waves, but Taihu stones compile the liquid physics into an alphabet of epsilons and upsilons – the sinusoidal cells of tidal swells and the shapes that sign the lunar paths.
Paul Prudence, Figured Stones: Exploring the Lithic Imaginary