Tessellation Creatures

Above: Bison Tessellation

Math meets Art in the repetition of shapes that tessellate like puzzle pieces locking together without gaps in an infinite pattern. Tessellations are a hands-on way to explore STEAM concepts by arranging or tiling a basic shape that is positioned from one of three processes including: translation, rotation, or reflection. Hexagons, equilateral triangles, or squares are shapes that can be transformed into tessellations.

What might seem like a simple concept actually challenges students to develop complex skills such as:

positive/negative shapes
grid concept
abstract thinking
intuitive sense
spacial relation skills
eye-hand coordination
problem solving

M.C. Escher, a Dutch artist (1898-1972), is best known for his mathematically inspired drawings and prints which displayed great realism, while at the same time showing impossible perspective, eye trickery and metamorphosis.

7th Grade artists created complex tessellations beginning from a square using the translation method by cutting a shape from one side and sliding it along a plane to tape onto the other side. This new shape takes up the exact same area as it did before but the side with the piece cut away has an exact negative of the side with the piece taped on. Nothing is added to or taken away when we tessellate this shape. The positive and negative spaces fit together like puzzle pieces.

Once students had tessellated their shapes, they had to tap into their imagination and abstract thinking to determine what type of creature their shape looked like? This was a fun process to collaborate on with the students as they held their shapes up in the air, squinting at them while rotating and asking each other what they saw in the shape. It reminded me of how I used to gaze up into the clouds as a kid from the backseat of our family van visualizing stories in the shapes I saw. My student assistant who is part of the NBHS Peer Mentor program jumped right in helping students visualize creatures from their tessellation shapes! Is it a wolf or a parrot? A bird? Ghost? What do you think?

I had my students think of at least two possible creatures from their tessellation. It was exciting to see their originality and creativity in this process by adding details to create something out of nothing.

With their concepts in place, students began the final artwork by preparing their paper with a 1 inch border and tracing their template in a repeating pattern to fill the space. They drew their creatures in the positive spaces, outlining them in sharpie pen.

The next step involved practicing drawing fundamentals as a class with value changes in blended shading and hatching techniques using pen and ink.

Students had the artistic choice to shade each tessellation with colored pencil or to alternate the shaded creature with sections of pattern using pen.

Over the next couple days, the tessellation creatures were developing nicely.

As an art teacher, I appreciate how each tessellation my students created has unique shapes and different creatures. No two artworks look the same! Here are some of the final pieces from their unit.