Toward Fractal Calligraphy

Abstract

Rooted in ancient Chinese binary and ternary cosmological ideas, through the generation of infinite, congruent brushstrokes and characters, Chinese calligraphy is fractal. Starting from Sierpinski’s gasket, this paper explains and demonstrates fractal calligraphy by applying the algorithms behind this triangular fractal, the Pythagorean tree, the binary decomposition, and the Mandelbrot and Julia sets, etc., to calligraphy. This paper also discusses the connections among the Fuxi Sixty-four Hexagram Diagram, selected trigrams, tetragrams, hexagrams, and the Cantorian triadic bar. These connections reveal that Shao Yong’s (1011-1077) insightful hexagram interpretations as well as Laozi’s triadic cosmology both reflect the spirit of fractals