Hung Phuc Hoang
TU Wien, Austria
Hung Phuc Hoang is a mathematician from Vietnam who works on combinatorial reconfiguration problems
the artwork
Dịch Biến - Diện Bích
Vietnamese - Movement and Transformation - Wall gazing - 2023 - digital
This artwork was created by my friend, Đỗ Công Lý, after our inspiring conversation on combinatorial reconfiguration, a common theme across many problems in my research. I like the subtle symbolism in this work. The main connection between my culture and science is through the title (see the word play below). The other connection is through the number nine that appears both in the tale of Bodhidharma and in the number of tiles of the Rubik’s cube. Finally, the meditation of the monk in front of the face of the cube can symbolise the research (a careful study) of combinatorial reconfiguration.
Hung Phuc Hoang
paths to mathematics - the artist's audio commentary
Hung, What is the first mathematics you remember doing yourself?
Hung, What drove you into doing mathematcis??
Hung, Why do you do mathematics?
Hung, In what moments do you struggle in science?
Hung, What do you enjoy in the everyday life of a mathematician?
Mathematics in Vietnamese Culture
The title, “Dịch biến – Diện bích”, features spoonerism, a common word play in Vietnamese where we swap the components of two words to form two new words. The first two words mean “movement and transformation”, capturing the research of reconfiguration and graph algorithms in general. The second two words mean “wall gazing”. Part of the phrase “cửu niên diện bích” (nine years of wall gazing), it refers to the tale of Bodhidharma meditating in a cave for nine years. I find it an interesting word play, with one part on change and the other on distancing from the changes of the outside world issues.
Hung Phuc Hoang
