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Droste effect

TheDroste effect(Dutch pronunciation:[ˈdrɔstə]), known in art as an example ofmise en abyme,is the effect of a picturerecursivelyappearing within itself, in a place where a similar picture would realistically be expected to appear. This produces a loop which in theory could go on forever, but in practice only continues as far as the image's resolution allows.

The original 1904 Droste cocoa tin, designed by Jan Misset (1861–1931)[a]

The effect is named afterDroste,a Dutch brand ofcocoa,with an image designed by Jan Misset in 1904. The Droste effect has since been used in the packaging of a variety of products. Apart from advertising, the effect is also seen in the Dutch artistM. C. Escher's 1956 lithographPrint Gallery,which portrays a gallery that depicts itself. The effect has been widely used on the covers ofcomic books,mainly in the 1940s.

Effect

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Further information:Mathematics and art

Origins

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TheDrosteeffect is named after the image on the tins and boxes ofDrostecocoapowder which displayed a nurse carrying a serving tray with a cup of hot chocolate and a box with the same image, designed by Jan Misset.[2]This familiar image was introduced in 1904 and maintained for decades with slight variations from 1912 by artists includingAdolphe Mouron.The poet and columnist Nico Scheepmaker introduced wider usage of the term in the late 1970s.[3]

Mathematics

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Droste effect byimage manipulation

The appearance isrecursive:the smaller version contains an even smaller version of the picture, and so on.[4]Only in theory could this go on forever, asfractalsdo; practically, it continues only as long as theresolutionof the picture allows, which is relatively short, since each iterationgeometricallyreduces the picture's size.[5][6]


Medieval art

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The Droste effect was anticipated byGiottoearly in the 14th century, in hisStefaneschi Triptych.The altarpiece portrays in its centre panelCardinalGiacomo Gaetani Stefaneschioffering the triptych itself toSt. Peter.[7]There are also several examples from medieval times of books featuring images containing the book itself or window panels in churches depicting miniature copies of the window panel itself.[8]

  • The early 14th centuryStefaneschi Triptych.In the central panel is the kneeling figure of Cardinal Stefaneschi...
  • ... who is holding the triptych itself.

M. C. Escher

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The Dutch artistM. C. Eschermade use of the Droste effect in his 1956 lithographPrint Gallery,which portrays a gallery containing a print which depicts the gallery, each time both reduced and rotated, but with a void at the centre of the image. The work has attracted the attention of mathematicians includingHendrik Lenstra.They devised a method of filling in the artwork's central void in an additional application of the Droste effect by successively rotating and shrinking an image of the artwork.[4][9][10]

Advertising

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In the 20th century, the Droste effect was used to market a variety of products. The packaging ofLand O'Lakesbutter featured aNative Americanwoman holding a package of butter with a picture of herself.[4]Morton Saltsimilarly made use of the effect.[11]The cover of the 1969 vinyl albumUmmagummabyPink Floydshows the band members sitting in various places, with a picture on the wall showing the same scene, but the order of the band members rotated.[12]The logo ofThe Laughing Cowcheese spread brand pictures a cow with earrings. On closer inspection, these are seen to be images of the circular cheese spread package, each bearing the image of the mascot itself.[4] The Droste effect is a theme inRussell Hoban's children's novel,The Mouse and His Child,appearing in the form of a label on a can of "Bonzo Dog Food" which depicts itself.[13][14]

Comic books

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The Droste effect has been a motif for the cover ofcomic booksfor many years, known as an "infinity cover". Such covers were especially popular during the 1940s. Examples includeBatman#8 (December 1941–January 1942),Action Comics#500 (October 1979), andBongo ComicsFree For All!(2007 ed.).Little Giant Comics#1 (July 1938) is said to be the first-published example of an infinity cover.[15]

Video games

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The main menu screen forThe Stanley Parable(and the re-releaseThe Stanley Parable: Ultra Deluxe), known for its self-referential humor and commentary about video games, shows the protagonist's desk on which a computer monitor displays the same main menu screen. Besides having the expected Droste effect where the computer monitor renders itself recursively, this is a rare example of the Droste effect extending the other direction out of its own medium into the real world, since the player is also presumably sitting behind their desk looking at a computer monitor.[citation needed]

See also

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Notes

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  1. ^Johannes (Jan) Misset was born in Haarlem on 8 March 1861 to Willem Jacobus Misset and Catharina Schmidt, and worked as a painter of advertisements. He designed the nurse image for Jan Gerard Droste, based on the paintingLa serveuse chocolat(c. 1745) byJean-Étienne Liotard.[1]The Droste tin design was reworked only eight years later by "Cassandre" (Adolphe Mouron) into its more famous form. Misset died in Haarlem on 26 August 1931, so his design is out of copyright.

References

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  1. ^"1863–1918 from confectioner to chocolate producer".Droste.Archived fromthe originalon 4 March 2016.Retrieved28 February2018.Around the year 1900 the illustration of the "nurse" appeared on Droste's cocoa tins. This is most probably invented by the commercial artist Jan (Johannes) Musset [misspelling for Misset], who had been inspired by a pastel of the Swiss painter Jean Etienne Liotard "La serveuse de chocolat", also known as "La belle chocolatière".
  2. ^"Bedenker van Droste-effect bekend",Trouw,1 August 1994. Note that many sources misspell his last name as Musset.
  3. ^"Droste, altijd welkom".cultuurarchief.nl.Archivedfrom the original on 30 March 2008.Retrieved18 November2007.
  4. ^abcdMerow, Katharine (2013)."Escher and the Droste Effect".Mathematical Association of America.Archivedfrom the original on 2 August 2013.
  5. ^Nänny, Max; Fischer, Olga (2001).The Motivated Sign: Iconicity in Language and Literature.John Benjamins.p. 37.ISBN978-90-272-2574-0.
  6. ^Juola, Patrick; Ramsay, Stephen (2017).Six Septembers: Mathematics for the Humanist.Zea Books. p.116.ISBN978-1-60962-111-7.By putting a picture inside a picture, you get a progression of successively smaller, but self-similar images (the box of Droste cocoa has a picture of a woman holding a box of Droste cocoa... ). In theory, this nesting could go on forever into infinite detail, but in practical terms, the resolution of the image limits how it's actually drawn.
  7. ^"Giotto di Bondone and assistants: Stefaneschi triptych".The Vatican.Archivedfrom the original on 30 November 2016.Retrieved23 June2008.
  8. ^See the collection of articlesWhatling, Stuart (16 February 2009)."Medieval 'mise-en-abyme': the object depicted within itself"(PDF).Courtauld Institute.Archived from the original on 2 November 2013.for examples and opinions on how this effect was used symbolically.
  9. ^de Smit, B.; Lenstra, H. W. (2003)."The Mathematical Structure of Escher's Print Gallery"(PDF).Notices of the American Mathematical Society.50(4):446–451.Archived(PDF)from the original on 16 April 2021.Retrieved28 April2021.
  10. ^Lenstra, Hendrik; De Smit, Bart."Applying mathematics to Escher's Print Gallery".Leiden University.Archived fromthe originalon 14 January 2018.Retrieved10 November2015.
  11. ^Barr, Jason; Mustachio, Camille D. G. (15 May 2014).The Language of Doctor Who: From Shakespeare to Alien Tongues.Rowman & Littlefield.p. 41.ISBN978-1-4422-3481-9.Archivedfrom the original on 10 February 2019.Retrieved17 October2016.
  12. ^Den Hartog, Ben (11 November 2011)."The Droste effect on Pink Floyd album Ummagumma".OtherFocus. Archived fromthe originalon 24 November 2015.Retrieved21 September2015.
  13. ^Kelly, Stuart (31 December 2013)."The Mouse and His Child by Russell Hoban: moving metaphysics for kids".The Guardian.Archivedfrom the original on 14 November 2017.Retrieved13 November2017.
  14. ^"Bonzo Canned Dog Food".Box Vox. 20 November 2013.Archivedfrom the original on 14 November 2017.Retrieved13 November2017.
  15. ^Cronin, Brian (15 December 2018)."What Was the First Comic Book 'Infinity Cover'?".Comic Book Resources.Retrieved19 January2022.
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