is the title of a new doctoral thesis in German language by Albrecht Pohlmann, 1910, University of Halle.

It describes also Ostwald’s activities with the Bridge, the Munich "Institute for the Organization of Intelellectual Work" (Chapter 4. 2. 2) and contains some further chapters of interest also for media historians like chapter 8.3. "The copied image" and others.

Wilhelm Ostwald (1853-1932), who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1909, is among the scientists who have devoted themselves to the principles of visual design. This dissertation comprehensively represents, for the first time, the genesis of his colour theory in the scientific, art political, art historical and aesthetic context of its time. Since 1903 he devoted himself to painting technique, and finally, in 1914, he developed a colour atlas on behalf of the Deutscher Werkbund. His aim was to create an authoritative colour system as a means of understanding for artists, designers and architects, given the confusingly large amount of new colourants. Ostwald established a new theory of body colours based upon the four-colour theorem of Ewald Hering, which made it possible to measure colours in a simple manner. At the same time, from the organizing principles of his colour system (a colour solid in the form of a double cone) he developed a colour harmony. After World War I, he encountered protest of expressionist artists. Constructivists and functionalists took particular interest in his theories, such as with the Dutch ‘De-Stijl’ group, the Russian avant-garde movement and at the Bauhaus, where Ostwald taught in 1927 at the invitation of Walter Gropius. The main objective of his art technological research was to create a universal grammar of visual media in the era of the second technological revolution, hence his interest in photography, abstract film and picture transmission. The reproducibility of works of art appeared to him to be the requirement of a democratic society. His practical art technological experiments were embedded in a comprehensive art and media theory, which Ostwald had developed on the basis of his “Energetics” (1891) and his positivist “Philosophy of Nature” (1902).

The post Between science and art - a new thesis by Albrecht Pohlmann on Wilhelm Ostwald first appeared on Creative Combinatorics.

“Creations and Structures – Relation between art and science” is the title of an excerpt of a bilangual book by Dietrich Schulze (Viaduct : Kunst und Wissenschaft – Art and Science. Dresden : Saxonia-Verl. für Recht, Wirtschaft und Kultur, 2006). Ostwald is mentioned!

The post Art and science first appeared on Creative Combinatorics.

Many people view arts and sciences as being different because sciences yield objective answers to problems whereas arts produce subjective experiences I argue that art and science are on a continuum in which artists work with possible worlds whereas scientists are constrained to working in this world. But sometimes perceiving this world differently is the key to making discoveries. Thus, arts and sciences are on a continuum in which artistic thinking produces possibilities that scientists can evaluate for efficacy here and now. Not surprisingly, then, many of the most innovative scientists have had avocations in the arts, and some of the most innovative artists have had avocations in the sciences. These polymaths have often written or spoken about how their arts involvments have benefitted their scientific creativity and may provide a model for fostering a more innovative education.

Robert Root-Bernstein: The art of innovation: polymthas and universality of the creative process, in: Larisa V. Shavinia (Ed.): The International Handbook of Innovation. Oxford: Elsevier, 2003. PP. 267-278.

He argues that “artistic scientists and engineers have more image-ination, musically talented
ones duet (do it) better, and the verbally inclined have the skills to become pundits. Seriously.” (p. 270), and cited (on p. 268) Ostwald who “produced a large body of work on scientific genius that validated the polymath hypothesis”.

This supported by J. Rogers Hollingsworth who argued that:

the wider the range of experience and knowledge of the scientist, the more fields of science his/her work are likely to influence and the greater the importance with which it will be perceived. (p. 140)

J. Rogers Hollingsworth, “High Cognitive Complexity and the Making of Major Scientific Discoveries,” in Arnaud Sales and Marcel Fournier, eds., Knowledge, Communication and Creativity. (London and Thousand Oaks, California: Sage Publications, 2007). pp. 129-155.

Ostwald is mentioned here in a table of “Twentieth-century scientists who made major discoveries and were also quite active in music, art, writing, crafts and politics” (pp. 142-144)

The post Combinatorics and creativity first appeared on Creative Combinatorics.

… his greatest contribution to science and education was not his discovery of how to form oxides of nitrogen by passing a mixture of air and ammonia over a platinum catalyst (a discovery for which he received the Nobel Prize for Chemistry in 1909), but rather the emphasis he always placed in his writings and lectures on the need of the young generations’ acquiring at least a basic knowledge of what he called ‘basic philosophy’ during the years it devotes to its education in colleges and universities.

Ernst Alfred Hauser, The lack of natural philosophy in our education. In memoriam of Wilhelm Ostwald, in: Journal of Chemical Education 28 (1951) 492-494.

The post Philosophy of Science in Higher Education in Science and Technology first appeared on Creative Combinatorics.

• In April 2008 I visited Kettle’ Yard in Cambridge, Greta Britain and the its special exhibition Beyond Measure: conversations across art and science.

  

  (Picture via http://www.kettlesyard.co.uk/)

  This exhibition – with its associated workshops, talks and events – explores how geometry is used by artists and astronomers, bio-chemists, engineers, surgeons, architects, physicists and mathematicians – among many others – as a means to understand, explain and order the world around us. It draws parallels between the artist’s studio, the laboratory and the study as equivalent places for thinking, imagining and creating.

• In November last year I visited the Museum of Design in Zurich with the exhibition Nature Design – From Inspiration to Innovation.
  

  Nature has always been a source of inspiration for the design of the human environment. However, it cannot be overlooked that the connections between nature and the various design disciplines have once again become far more intensive in recent years. The Museum für Gestaltung Zürich refers with “Nature Design” to this phenomenon and presents an international selection of objects and projects from the fields of design, architecture, landscape architecture, art, photography and scientific research which do not simply depict or imitate nature but use it as a starting point and a reservoir of inspiration to present innovative answers to the relationship between man and nature.

The post Two exhibitions I came across: Beyond Measure and Nature Design first appeared on Creative Combinatorics.