Access

Books and Arts

Nature 446, 982 (26 April 2007) | doi:10.1038/446982a; Published online 25 April 2007

Science in culture: A sense of proportion

Martin Kemp1

Top

A painting of Federico Zuccari, the founder of the academy of arts in Rome, clearly demonstrates his credentials in geometry.

Why, in the portrait shown here, is the founding father of the Roman academy of arts, Federico Zuccari, depicted displaying some rudimentary geometric diagrams? He shows us a point, parallel and perpendicular lines, angles of 60 and 45 degrees, triangles, a circle, a semicircle and a square.