Squaring the Circle

The Quattro was originally designed as an exploration of the relationship between squares and circles. While examining this topic, I came across the expression "squaring the circle." It is a reference to an impossible mathematical problem that involves finding the area of a square and a circle and having them be equal. It is an unsolvable problem because the value of pi is indefinite. So, it turns out that the expression "squaring the circle" is a metaphor for doing something logically or intuitively impossible.

I liked the metaphor. When I worked in the film industry, it seemed we were always trying to do the impossible -- shut down the Brooklyn Bridge in the middle of the day, fly a helicopter to pick up a singer off of a small island in the East River in the middle of the night, stop traffic in the middle of Times Square.

We were often told by the NYC Mayor's Office of Film & Television that we could not do what we wanted. And then we had to come up with a way around it. We shot the scene on the Brooklyn Bridge at 4:00 in the morning (and changed the script accordingly). We found the best helicopter pilot, Al Cerullo, in NYC who the Mayor's office would allow to pick up a person on an island in the middle of the East River. (It was said that Al could hover an inch above an egg in high winds and not crack it.) We went ahead and stopped traffic in Times Square but just for very short periods of time, 15-30 seconds, and then cut the sequences together to make the scene appear seamless.

Working in the film industry taught me that what you think is impossible, is not necessarily unachievable, you just have to come up with another way to do it. And in the end, the Quattro, can be a reminder that the seemingly impossible is often highly possible.

Both pendants pictured above are available at Max's in Minneapolis.