Pablo Picasso was a Spanish painter, known for his influential paintings, his ingenious use of cubism, and for inventing the technique of constructed sculpture. Picasso was an exceptional artist of his time, he did paint not what was admired by the world, but instead he painted what he saw. He was an abstract painter, just like how chemistry is a very abstract topic that comes in many shapes and explanations.
To start off, my painting is a mixture of chemistry, pop art, and inspiration taken from Picasso. This painting is centered on the molecule of CH4, because of its artistic symmetrical tetrahedral form. Pop art was also used, because of its noticeable and eye catching vibrant colours, with each quadrant a different colour from its neighbour. In addition, the canvas was split in straight edge shapes, where each quadrant holds something from either a part of the face (eyes, nose, lips, and ears), which when put together form a portrait, or on the other hand, the chemistry quadrants when put together form the chemical bonding of carbon and hydrogen molecules. The ideas found in the chemistry quadrants portray the big ideas by Peter Atkins.
The first big idea is that matter is made of atoms. This is effectively seen as molecules can be found in the artwork and coexist with the world suggested by the human portrait representing the world. In addition it can also be found on the bottom left with the emission spectrum and just on top coming out from the tetrahedral demonstrating wave particle duality (the white dots demonstrate the particles).
The second big idea, elements display periodicity, can be seen in the sizes of the atoms. The hydrogen molecules are the smallest atoms in the painting; neon and rubidium are both placed similarly to the periodic table. Next there is carbon which is bigger than neon, but smaller than rubidium. In addition each atom is surrounded by its given number of valence electrons.
The third big idea, chemical bonds are formed when electrons pair, is represented by many aspects in this painting. Firstly, in the top left corner, we can see that carbon has an electron configuration of 1s22s22p2, but in order to bond with the four hydrogens it must “promote” its electron of the 2s orbital to the 2p orbital in order for it to be able to make bonds resulting in a configuration of 1s22s12p3. To the right, a graph with a red line is identified as the explanation of chemical bonds as they strive to achieve minimum potential energy. The large pink section demonstrates the shared electrons and their dipole moments, where the same coloured arrows will cancel out. A shared bond is then formed, which can be seen in the small green section.
The fourth big idea is that molecular shape is a crucial feature in chemistry, which can be seen as a sp3 orbital. There are two tetrahedrals to emphasize the symmetry of the painting, one in blue and one in yellow. In the middle, an exact angle of 109.5º describes the tetrahedral shape. At the bottom, in the orbital representation of CH4 they all share a white link, which represents that the all have sigma bonds between s-sp3. Next a 3-D representation of the chemical bond can be found.
The sixth idea of energy being conserved is also represented by the emission spectrum. The light spectrum can also be seen on the left where the eye looks through a prism that refracts light and gives colour.
The ninth idea, there are only four types of reaction, shows one type of reaction at the bottom with a combustion reaction (by the fire zigzags) between CH4 and an oxygen molecule.
To conclude, many would like to argue that art and science are effectively two extremely different domains. One plays on the aspect of creativity, while the other depends on understanding how the world functions. But the truth is that the world revolves around both; one cannot live without the other. Chemistry and art play a bigger role than we could ever imagine.
-K.H. a.k.a Potassium Hydride