George David Birkhoff Proposes the Aesthetic Measure

Event

Fifteen black polygonal forms are arranged in a grid with their calculated aesthetic measures printed underneath. — George D. Birkhoff, Aesthetic Measure (1933), Plate II: aesthetic measures of polygonal forms, nos. 1–15. From an annotated scanned copy. George D. Birkhoff, Aesthetic Measure (Harvard University Press, 1933), Plate II. Scan hosted by Architexturez. Copyright 1933 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College. Image source.

This important development in the twentieth-century attempt to measure aesthetics described aesthetic effectiveness by its degree of complexity and order.

Text by Peter Bauman. Generative Art Timeline, Le Random, fact-checked September 2026.

Sources

Garabedian, C. A. Review of Aesthetic Measure, by George D. Birkhoff, 7. Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society 40, no. 1 (1934).

People

George David Birkhoff

Movements

Math Art, aesthetics, information aesthetics

Filed under

Ideas: aesthetics, complexity, mathematics, order, perception
People: George David Birkhoff
Works: Aesthetic Measure, David

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