ABSTRACT
Students often raise their eyebrows – and their hands – when people show them how to generate proportional objects using a compass and a straight-edge. The diagonal lines of a geometric drawing often give rise to irrational numbers – something that computers only approximate. The reason for this limit is structural. The most apparent formal issue present within the universal grid is the reliance on constant intervals. Measurements are largely additive and orthogonal. Despite the apparent compositional restraints, the project readily supplies a large set of variables that make themselves visible as the exercise progresses. Observing the examples for the five strategies, certain general issues readily make themselves visible. A comprehensive survey of the bounding and axis lines within the project reveals a plethora of visible, formal relationships. The resulting visual complexity of the boundaries/axes model manifest themselves as a catalogue of existing object properties without either inference or purpose.
