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A Museum Exhibit Beyond the World of Numbers: Mathematica from Charles and Ray Eames, 1961
Mon, July 13, 2:30 to 4:00pm, Edinburgh Futures Institute, 1.55English Abstract
In the late 1950s, the International Business Machines Corp. (IBM) presented a new challenge when they commissioned a mathematically-themed exhibition for the new California Museum of Science and Industry in Los Angeles. With the stated intention of teaching “the joy and excitement that mathematicians find in pursuing their science,” the team of designers Charles and Ray Eames fulfilled IBM’s contract through consulting with working mathematicians and creating interactive, material representations of equations (and other mathematical objects). What came to be called “Mathematica: A World of Numbers…and Beyond” had wide geographic circulation: appearing not only in Los Angeles but also in the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, the 1964-65 World’s Fair in Queens, New York, the Pacific Science Center in Seattle, and the Science Museum in Hong Kong. Likewise, Mathematica’s interactive exhibits had (and continue to have) wide conceptual range: probability, celestial mechanics, understandings of surfaces, projective geometry, machines, and centrally the history of mathematics. Despite the robust circulation of mathematically-inspired museum objects, debates have emerged over the “Men of Modern Mathematics” exhibit, with museum-goers trying to see themselves in what once was an entirely male and predominantly European presentation of disciplinary history. The “reimagined” versions of Mathematica, currently on display at the Museum of Science in Boston and New York Hall of Science in Queens, address the inclusion of historical images beyond those of male mathematicians by depicting (mainly) Ray Eames and her role in the construction of the interactive exhibits and (to a lesser extent) museum-goers over the years. Through drawing attention to such moments, this presentation provides a case study in the limits of circulation: even when mathematical objects have impressive geographic and conceptual range, their past travels along with them.