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Penrose Stairway


PenroseStairway

An impossible figure in which a stairway in the shape of a square appears to circulate indefinitely while still possessing normal steps (Penrose and Penrose 1958). The Dutch artist M. C. Escher included a Penrose stairway in his mind-bending illustration "Ascending and Descending" (Bool et al. 1982, p. 321; Forty 2003, Plate 68). Distorted variations of the stairway are also depicted in Escher's "House of Stairs" (Bool et al. 1982, p. 301; Forty 2003, Plate 40).

In the 1998 film The Avengers, Uma Thurman is shown walking down a Penrose stairway and ending up back where she began.


See also

Impossible Figure, Schroeder Stairs

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References

Bool, F. H.; Kist, J. R.; Locher, J. L.; and Wierda, F. M. C. Escher: His Life and Complete Graphic Work. New York: Abrams, 1982.Escher, M. C. "House of Stairs." Lithograph. 1951. http://www.mcescher.com/Gallery/back-bmp/LW375.jpg.Escher, M. C. "Ascending and Descending." Lithograph. 1960. http://www.mcescher.com/Gallery/recogn-bmp/LW435.jpg.Forty, S. M.C. Escher. Cobham, England: TAJ Books, 2003.Hofstadter, D. R. Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid. New York: Vintage Books, p. 15, 1989.Jablan, S. "Impossible Figures." http://members.tripod.com/~modularity/impos.htm.Pappas, T. "Optical Illusions and Computer Graphics." The Joy of Mathematics. San Carlos, CA: Wide World Publ./Tetra, p. 5, 1989.Penrose, L. S. and Penrose, R. "Impossible Objects: A Special Type of Visual Illusion." Brit. J. Psychology 49, 31-33, 1958.Robinson, J. O. and Wilson, J. A. "The Impossible Colonnade and Other Variations of a Well-Known Figure." Brit. J. Psych. 64, 363-365, 1973.Seckel, A. The Art of Optical Illusions. Carlton Books, p. 21, 2002.

Referenced on Wolfram|Alpha

Penrose Stairway

Cite this as:

Weisstein, Eric W. "Penrose Stairway." From MathWorld--A Wolfram Web Resource. https://mathworld.wolfram.com/PenroseStairway.html

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