Shape

334 III Using It to Design
and ‘‘supplemental squares’’
But, really, I can try any identity or rule—I’m free to see and do as I please.
A strictly generative account of style may not be enough. Saying what you see as
you make what you want matters, too. Ambiguity isn’t noise, it’s something to use.
And this is how shapes and rules work. I can always add the identities I need to see
what’s important and describe it independent of the rules I apply to produce designs.
Embedding and transformations make this possible once shapes fuse, so that generative
and descriptive aspects of style are on equal footing and can change with ongoing
experience. Understanding a style is more than connoisseurship and forgery. There are
other things to see and to say, as well, that go beyond recognizing instances and copying
them in a particular way, or branching out to make new ones. And I needn’t miss
any of this when I calculate with shapes and rules.
There’s always more to see and do. Not all of the lattice designs in Dye’s Grammar
are regular patterns. In particular, there are marvelous ‘‘ice-rays’’
To appreciate [these] designs . . . one needs to see ice forming on quiet water on a cold night.
Straight lines meet longer lines, making unique and beautiful patterns. The Chinese term this
ice-line, or lines formed by cracking ice; I have described it as the result of a molecular strain in
shrinking or breaking, but more recent observations and photographs seem to prove that it is a
conventionalization of ice-formation which has become traditional.
And by now, it shouldn’t be a surprise that ice-rays are made by calculating.