Mathematicians ask: can an illustration be rigorous?
Illustration Beyond Proof
At a January workshop at Institut Henri Poincaré, mathematicians, historians, artists, and educators explored whether mathematical illustration can be rigorous. The discussions, later published in the Notices of the AMS, argue that proof is not the only form of mathematical knowledge. Drawing on historical examples and contemporary debates, they show how illustration can reveal new mathematics, not just explain known results, and propose the art crit as a model for evaluating visual work.
In the same way that a good proof shows more than just its result, a good illustration does much more than demonstrate a form or pattern.