9. Continuum Mechanics, Art and Structures

The publication of Isaac Newton’s Principia in the late seventeenth century paved the way for dramatic developments in the eighteenth century. By the beginning of the nineteenth century, scientists were prepared to take on the challenge of the mechanics of three-dimensional deformable bodies. Theories governing the mechanics of fluids, solids, and the diffusion of heat were formulated using the newly developed platform called continuum mechanics. By the middle of the nineteenth century, the concepts of classical mechanics had reached a degree of maturity. It was left for the Impressionist artists of the latter third of the century to push art in a direction that could be said to have been the prelude to moving beyond the bounds of continuum mechanics. At the same time, engineers began using the new-found theoretical models to develop a field of mechanics termed structural mechanics.