Untitled [pinecone] Overlay of Hand-Drawn Design of Fibonacci Spiral

Nature's Forms: Pattern Texture, and Rhythm in Natural Objects from the Collection
July 26, 2010 to June 29, 2012
Most pine cones have two distinct directions in which their bracts spiral. The number of visible spirals in each direction is oftentimes two consecutive Fibonacci numbers.
   As seen in the pine cone overlay drawing, the specimen that Feininger photographed has eight spirals in one direction, and thirteen spirals in another direction. Eight and thirteen are consecutive numbers in the Fibonacci sequence.

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Structures of Nature: Photographs by Andreas Feininger
August 21, 2002 to May 18, 2003
This photograph and drawing demonstrate Feininger’s interest in nature’s geometric structures, particularly the Fibonacci series that appears regularly in the spiral designs of objects such as the seeds of sunflowers, florets of daisies, and scales of pineapples. The Fibonacci series is an unending sequence in which the following number is a sum of the previous two numbers: 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, etc. In the pine cone, the scales radiate out in opposing spirals; eight extending in one direction and thirteen in another, which is a ratio close to the Golden Section and the number 0.6180334.