Synectron-Square-Circle, 1976

Nausika Pastra initially worked on anthropocentric compositions made of clay, plaster and bronze. Settling in Paris in 1963 she began to replace inspiration with mathematics. This turn led in 1968 to experiments with compositions in two basic geometrical shapes, the square and the circle, which then became the basis for the development of her later work. Taking these two shapes as structural forms recognized by everyone she used the methods of induction and deduction, that is, analysis and composition, and she created a new dynamic shape, which arose from the combination of the square and the circle: the “Synectron”, as she called it. This composition, for the creation of which Pastra was awarded a letters patent by the French state in 1971, is part of the series “Proportions I”, done during the period 1968-1976, and is a first study in two dimensions.