Tigran Tahta, mathematician and teacher

Tigran Tahta (7 August 1928 – 2 December 2006) was a British mathematician, teacher and writer of Armenian origin. Among his pupils was the theoretical physicist and cosmologist Stephen Hawking, who said it was Tahta who awakened his interest in science; thanks to him Hawking became a professor of mathematics at the University of Cambridge.

Tahta was born into an Armenian cotton-trading family based in Istanbul. His father, Kevork Takhtabronian, settled in Manchester with his wife in 1927 and later shortened the family name to Tahta.

The collage shows, on the left, a smiling white-haired man and, on the right, a young man in a wheelchair in front of a blackboard covered with formulas.