Saint George and the Dragon

Uccello painted the dragon's wings as concentric circles striped in alternating colours — the same pattern as the *mazzocchio*, a wooden hat-form Uccello drew obsessively as a perspective exercise. Every feather sits on the next ring of the same spiral. The dragon is not a creature; it is geometry that happens to bite. The princess holding the chain around its neck looks unconcerned because she is leading a mathematical demonstration. Now at the National Gallery, London @nationalgallery