Photograph of The Great Minimal Surface sculpture

Photograph of a sculpture created by Morton C. Bradley, Jr., in 2004. This sculpture is composed of Schoen minimal surface gyroids. The Great Minimal Surface begins Bradley’s Minimal Surface series, the most innovative and distinct series of sculptural expressions in the artist’s career. A minimal surface is a surface with a mean curvature of zero, meaning that the maximum upward curvature and downward curvature are equal and opposite. A zero mean curvature creates fluid, saddle-shaped forms, often called gyroids, which can be fitted together in honeycomb structures. The initial work concerning minimal surfaces was pioneered by German mathematician Hermann Amandus Schwarz in 1865, and expanded upon by Alan Schoen, a NASA senior scientist. Instead of completing the complex formulas to generate the surfaces, Schoen hypothesized what surfaces certain formulas would produce, then hired a friend and fabricator of Bradley’s, Harald Robinson, to create a sculptural model. Robinson shared the plastic casts he created with Bradley as they fostered their personal and working relationship. Bradley, inspired by exploring such a new form towards the end of his life, embarked on the creation of his own minimal surface piece.