Shape

376 III Using It to Design
and spiraling meanders
that vary in terms of the spatial relations given to define rules in her schemas. Assignments
allow for shapes to be rearranged in spatial relations and for new shapes to be
introduced. For example, I might start with the spatial relation
between two triangles, flip the large triangle to get the spatial relation
and then replace the large triangle with a square
all in accordance with the enumeration I set out before. And I can continue this in
other ways, perhaps ‘‘dragging’’ points
to turn the square into a quadrilateral with corresponding changes to the triangle. The
repertoire of schemas from the series x fi A þ B, x fi A þ B þ C; ... is more or less constant,
while rules are defined in alternative ways to produce different results. Knight
proves the general paradigm in a special case. It’s marvelous—styles and how they
change depend on schemas, assignments, and transformations in given algebras. But
undoubtedly I’ve missed a lot in my gloss of the essential facts. Knight would probably
see it another way, as well, and there’s no one better to believe than the author. One