M.C. Escher was well-known for his famous woodcuttings, lithographs and prints, many of which depicted various geometric patterns of symmetry. Having lived through World War II, and being self-taught in the science of advanced mathematics, Escher developed over 400 works and 450 prints during the course of his lifetime.
History
Maurits Cornelius Escher was born on June 17, 1898, in Leeuwarden, Netherlands, and died on March 27, 1972, in Laren, Netherlands. In 1924, Escher married his wife Jetta, and they moved to Rome to raise a family. In 1935, they moved from Italy to Switzerland and later Belgium to avoid political unrest that later became World War II. In 1941, he moved back to Holland, where he later died, because of the German occupation in Brussels. His last woodcut, "Snakes," was displayed in 1969 and took over 6 months to complete.
Education
Escher did not graduate high school. He showed early interest in music and carpentry in his early years and developed printmaking skills while in school. He later went on to Higher Technical Institute in Delft for a year, where he was able to enroll due to a loophole in Dutch law. In 1920, he enrolled at the School for Architecture and Decorative Arts in Haarlem, where he was encouraged and trained by Samuel Jesserum de Mesquita in pursuit of a graphics art program.
Development as an Artist
According to the National Gallery of Art, "While living in Italy from 1922 to 1935, [Escher] spent the spring and summer months traveling throughout the country to make drawings." Escher later turned these into prints while he lived in Rome. In 1936, he returned for the second time to the 14th-century palace the Alhambra in Granada, Spain, and this may have helped him shift his focus from landscapes, points out the National Gallery of Art.
Intrusion of War
Escher "was regularly heard to complain about his lack of natural drawing ability and as a result most of his pieces took a long time to complete," states biographer J.J. O'Connor. During World War II, Escher had difficulty concentrating on his art because of the war. In 1941, he wrote his first notebook, "Regular Division of the Plane with Asymmetric Congruent Polygons" that was not meant to be published. In 1944, his former mentor, de Mesquita, was murdered by the Nazis.
Influence of Mathematics
It is commonly believed that M.C. Escher was a mathematical genius. However, he was not a very good student and did not have any real interest in mathematics until October 1937 when he shared some of his woodcuttings with his brother, who was a geology professor. His brother saw a connection between crystallography and Escher's woodcuttings and shared several mathematical articles that he thought would help Maurits. This was Escher's first serious contact with mathematics. While Escher was never formally taught mathematics, he was able to grasp advanced concepts through his own study of previously published works that were later reflected in his own art.
