Rice 13 series

The Rice 13 gem shape is an irregular tessellating pentagon.  This means this shape, which has five unequal sides, can itself tile (cover) a plane (surface) with no gaps. There are 15 irregular pentagons known to tile the plane, numbered 1 through 15.  The Rice 13 shape is pentagon number 13 and was discovered by Marjorie Rice.

After reading a 1975 Scientific American article correcting a former claim that all possible irregular tessellating pentagons  had been discovered, Marjorie Rice started secretly sketching, and invented her own symbolic notation system. A housewife with only one year of high school math education, Marjorie discovered four more families of pentagons, numbered 9, 11, 12, and 13. Of 15 total known irregular tessellating pentagons, Marjorie discovered four.  She then took her tilings from math to art by adorning them with drawings of flowers, bees, and butterflies.

The use of this shape, and its name, celebrates all women, and people, who choose to follow their desires into “impossible” realms. It celebrates curiosity and the universal truth that math, nature, art, and beauty are one.