The Canon · Folio One
Plate XXV of XXIX
The Lorenz Attractor
The butterfly effect: two runs a billionth apart, then nothing alike.
Paper ground, a warm cream, on Hahnemühle Photo Rag, 308 gsm cotton
The plate
Edward N. Lorenz, Deterministic Nonperiodic Flow · Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1963
In 1963 the meteorologist Lorenz published three equations distilled from a model of convection. Their solution never settles, never retraces itself: it winds about two steady states, C and C′, switching without pattern, yet never leaves this shape. Below, two runs start a billionth apart. For 28 turns they are one line; then the gap, roughly doubling every turn, overwhelms them. Hence the question in the title of Lorenz’s 1972 talk: Does the flap of a butterfly’s wings in Brazil set off a tornado in Texas?
Computed, not drawn: every mark on the plate comes from the mathematics or from real data, and the type is set from the same files that go to the printer.
Sizes and prices
| Size | Unframed | Framed | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Small30 × 42 cm | £50$85 | £140$185 | 297 × 416 mm |
| Medium50 × 70 cm | £110$165 | £350$465 | 500 × 700 mm |
| Large70 × 98 cm | £190$255 | £520$695 | 700 × 980 mm |
- Paper: Hahnemühle Photo Rag, 308 gsm cotton, printed as a giclée by theprintspace.
- Printed in: London for the UK, Brooklyn for the US. Unframed prints travel rolled in a tube.
- Framed small: A3 (29.7 × 42 cm) frame, glazed with glass.
- Framed medium: 60 × 80 cm frame with a 5 cm window mount, glazed with 3 mm acrylic.
- Framed large: 70 × 100 cm frame, glazed with 3 mm acrylic.
- Frames: black, white or oak, solid wood, made in Germany. Each comes ready to hang.
- Edition: open, with a certificate. File version v1.