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| The
Art of M.C. Escher |
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Hooded
monks
perform
a mysterious
ritual,
some climbing
and some
descending
an endless
flight
of stairs
atop a
monastery
that seems
to exist
in a limbo
all its
own in
the lithograph
"Ascending
and Descending."
Two equally
enigmatic
figures
refrain
from the
task,
each seemingly
pondering
the hopelessness
of their
bretheren's
obsession.
L.S. and
Roger
Penrose
were the
originators
of the
visual
paradox
of the
endless
stair
in 1958,
presenting
it in
an issue
of the
British
Journal
of Psychology.
Sir Roger
Penrose
is a mathematical
physicist
and Professor
at Oxford
who shared
an award
for achievment
in quantum
phyisics
with Stephen
Hawking
in 1988.
His father,
L.S. Penrose,
was an
acclaimed
geneticist.
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