Mathematics: A Beautiful Elsewhere

The Fondation Cartier also invited a group of prestigious scientific institutions to participate: the Institut Henri Poincaré (IHP), the Institut d’Astrophysique de Paris (IAP), the European Laboratory for Particle Physics (CERN), the Institut National de Recherche en Informatique et en Automatique (INRIA), the University of Bordeaux/LABRI and the European Space Agency (ESA).

Two exceptional contributions will make it possible to observe the real-time evolution of two major projects of contemporary science: experiments with matter being conducted by the CERN inside THE LARGE HADRON COLLIDER (LHC), and the mapping of the early universe as recorded by THE PLANCK SPACECRAFT OF THE ESA whose data is being studied by European astronomers, notably at the IAP. In addition, Pierre-Yves Oudeyer and his colleagues at INRIA and Bordeaux University will display the latest results from their work, which concerns a SOCIETY OF ROBOTS ENDOWED WITH ARTIFICIAL CURIOSITY, the ERGO-ROBOTS. Their active presence in the exhibition is in itself an experiment that will allow these scientists to advance even further in their revolutionary research program.

The exhibition was developed in association with the Institut des Hautes Études Scientifiques (IHÉS) and under the patronage of UNESCO. It was coordinated by Hervé Chandès (General Director of the Fondation Cartier), Jean-Pierre Bourguignon (CNRS Research Director and Director of IHÉS), Michel Cassé (astrophysicist, CEA Research Director and Associate Researcher at IAP), with Giancarlo Lucchini, Thomas Delamarre and the entire staff at the Fondation Cartier. Visitors may continue to experience this “sudden change of scenery” via the exhibition catalog, an iPad application, the Fondation Cartier website, as well as by attending a series of events, the Nights of Uncertainty. Mathematics: A Beautiful Elsewhere is a geometric, algebraic, artistic and cinematographic mosaic that gives everyone a chance to experience fragments of mathematical beauty.