"Frontman" of mathematics, Cédric Villani signs autographs.

As soon as Cédric Villani appeared at the gate of Pavilion 2 at Riocentro, a long line formed at the IMPA stand this Tuesday (7). Everyone wanted an autograph, a photo and a chat with the pop mathematician, winner of the Fields Medal in 2010. Villani lived up to his nickname and attentively received each visitor who honored him at the ICM 2018 autograph session.

“In mathematics, you are, most of the time, alone. What I like most about sessions like this is meeting such different people, from diverse places and ages,” commented the Frenchman, elected to parliament last year by President Emmanuel Macron's party.

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As usual, his elegant suit, adorned with a silk bow tie and the peculiar spider brooch, attracted attention. Every now and then, one of the teenagers from Rio de Janeiro's public schools, invited to the open lecture by the Japanese speaker Tadashi Tokieda, would ask who Villani was, and then the line would grow longer.

“It’s very important to open their minds and broaden their paths,” argued Cícero Avelino, a teacher at the Joaquim Gomes de Souza State Mathematical College in Niterói. Founded three years ago, it was the first public school in Brazil focused on exact sciences. “When they interact with people who have changed their lives through mathematics, they realize that the field goes far beyond what they see in their daily lives,” the teacher stated.

This is what volunteer Ana Silva chose to rediscover throughout her life. A master's student in Mathematics at the Federal Fluminense University (UFF), she arrived early to ensure a meeting with Villani. "Every mathematician's dream is to win a Fields Medal, so it's an honor to be near him," the student exclaimed.

Paraguayan Álvaro Barrios, an exchange student at the Federal University of São Carlos (UFSCar), says his admiration for Villani goes back a long way: “I wasn’t familiar with the work that led him to Fields [partial differential equations], but I had already seen videos of all his lectures online.”

With his unique personality and a drawing of a Marsupilami (a comic book character) at the end of each signature, the pop mathematician undoubtedly won over more followers and future disseminators of the "poetry of science" this afternoon.