Anaptár, Intersection of art and science (artist's book)

Anaptár, The Intersection of Art and Science, a book with a unique hand-embroidered cover, is the successfully defended DLA thesis of graphic designer Anna Farkas. The dissertation explores the graphic representation of circular calendars, the graphic designer’s own method of rendering moon data in two dimensions, and the development of data visualization. Inspiration was drawn from various ancient and medieval calendars, sundials, clocks and time-measuring instruments, such as the Chankillo, the circular calendar of the Aztecs, the calendars of Nicholas of Lynn, or the Limbourg brothers’ book of hours. Whilst researching the relationship between art and science, the author also looked at the work of a number of natural scientists, among them Alexander von Humboldt, Galileo Galilei, Annie Jump Cannon and Cecilie Payne.
This artist’s book consists of 93,578 characters, or 12,431 words in 1598 lines, as well as 181 illustrations.
Anna Farkas’ dissertation piece won Communication Arts’ Award of Excellence and a Red Dot Award in the Publishing and Print Media category.