[-empyre-] Process as paradigm: Time/Tools/Agency

Yann Le Guennec y at x-arn.org
Wed May 26 05:49:22 EST 2010 

Hello,

A computer is not a content, and not a tool, it's a context, or like 
said Roy Ascott, it's an environment, and i would add that when 
connected to a global network, a computer is a sub-environment in a 
bigger one (like every system is potentialy a subsystem for many 
systems). And what is this environment doing ? Maybe building the 
ultimate simulation, ie, just the world we live in, the world we are 
coming from, a world made of bits, qbits, radioactive virtual particles 
and DNA. Self-organisation and evolution order have nothing to do with 
nature anymore. Nature is the illusion that maintain culture, boundaries 
between humans, machines and animals. But today, all that is codes, 
signs, models, simulations, without references, or nature, or essence, 
or reality. We live in simulations (as Baudrillard pointed out). Just 
check recent events about economic crisis, or flu global warning, or 
global warming.. for examples of simulations at global level.  Believing 
in this context that computers, bits in silicium, genetic codes, global 
networks connected to global economy at the speed of light, that all 
these entangled things are just tools, looks like... outdated 
positivism?, missing the fact that our existence at every level is 
getting modeled (at abstract level) by these things, that these things 
are deciding for us, for many instants in our life, more than we can 
decide for ourself, as human entities. So i's not about knowing or 
thinking that computers and code and... are tools or not, but to 
consider what they are and what they do from other points of views, in 
order to still be able to see the world we live in, even if it's a 
simulation, and possibly to figure out what can be an artist or an 
artwork in such a world.

That's also in this way that i can understand that an image can be, and 
finally is, generative: as a model, as part of a simulation.

Well... these are just some thoughts from a human also mobilized by 
love, hate, sex, birth, death, and also hope ... that these thoughts are 
  understandable, because english is often confusing for my brain...


Regards,
Yann



Maria Verstappen a écrit :
> Hello Chris, I don't think anyone here was talking about "data and
> machines being content"? But I think we all agree that a specific
> medium offers particular possibilities for expression so there is
> always a feedback loop between intentions and medium. A computer is
> mainly a processor, a tool to execute processes. We all use Photoshop
> or Open Office to process images and texts, software programs that
> were initially designed to replace tools like typewriter, pen,
> paintbrush, scissors, etc. But the computer as a tool has much more
> to offer, with the right skills (programming) we are able to make a
> more direct use of the significant features of the processor itself.
> We still see it as a tool, but we give the tool possibilities of
> creating something by itself. A collaboration between man and
> machine, in which the machine is not a total "slave" but having a
> certain degree of autonomy to act by itself, allowing
> unpredictability and surprise. To achieve this we have to design
> autonomously operating processes and processes of self-organisation.
> An important source of inspiration are the self-organising processes
> in our natural surroundings: the complex dynamics of all kinds of
> physical and chemical processes and the genetic-evolutionairy system
> of organic life that contineously creates new and original forms. So,
> this way of working can be seen as contemporary nature study, in
> which we concentrate on the possibilities that the underlying
> mechanisms of these processes can offer art by implementing processes
> of development and growth in a computer program. In these software
> programs we are not simulating the laws of our physical world, but
> instead we define an artificial (machine) nature that has its own
> generative principles and spontaneous expressions.
> 
> It's true that this approach relates to some degree to Modernism, but
> at the same time it is fundamentally different. In contrast to
> modernistic artwork - that attempts to reveal the underlying harmony
> of reality by rational ordering, control and reduction of visual
> means - we are actually striving for complexity and multiformity in
> the final result. On the other hand, we do use a form of minimalism
> in the design of the underlying generative process. The harmony model
> has been replaced by the conviction that chance, self-organisation
> and evolution order and transform reality. For us it is a challenge
> is to make these intrinsic qualities of nature manifest in an actual
> artwork, to exhibit these artworks in public, to finally establish "a
> meaningful dialogue with the world at large". Best, Maria
> 
> Driessens & Verstappen
> 
> 
> On May 25, 2010, at 6:38 AM, christopher sullivan wrote:
> 
>> 
>> kick me off this group if you like, but I cannot believe that in a
>> world full of hunger, politics, love, sex, children, moose, you
>> name it, that so many people think that Data, machines, are
>> content.
>> 
>> Eilean is making a valid comparison. At least I hope you realize
>> that those using image and sound as generative content, are not
>> just behind the times, we work differently than you, and to much
>> success. As a teacher I have told graduate students that I could
>> not work with them, three times. one wanted to make fashionable
>> purses, one was a color field painter (I sent them to fine color
>> field enthusiasts) and one animator who said they where not
>> interested in what there work was about. But in twenty years I have
>> run into nothing but people who look at there medium as a tool. I
>> much beloved tool, but a tool, a skill set, a craft, to be reckoned
>> with historically, but not the content of there work..
>> 
>> this is not about age, (I am 49) my 20 year old students are as
>> bored by glitches, chance operations, and algorithms as I am. a
>> computer IS a tool. If you have a relationship with it, that is
>> fine, but many complex thinkers,(I will call myself one) does look
>> at my cameras, sound recorders, computers, as tools. We make our
>> work about other things, like most filmmakers, writers, painters, 
>> play writes, have been doing forever. Why are so many New Media
>> artists and academics, embracing modernism at this moment in
>> history. do we really have so little faith in having a meaningful
>> dialogue with the world at large! where is your blood?
>> 
>> from the Love, hate, sex, birth, death guy, Chris.
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> Quoting Erika Jean Lincoln <fur_princess at yahoo.ca>:
>> 
>>> Hi Eileen,
>>> 
>>> I am going to have to disagree on your comparison. You stated
>>> that
>>>> The image as output seems to me the most active agent because
>>>> it is out in the world communicating.
>>> I don't think it is the image that communicates in the example we
>>> are looking at if that was the case then why have any process at
>>> all. the software communicates through the image.
>>> 
>>>> However, if one is more interested in the the data set being
>>>> "algorithmically" processed through a computer, then why waste
>>>> the paper to create an image that is non active at the end?
>>> I think the image can still be a part of the work, I feel that
>>> the way the work is described misplaces the location of the
>>> agency within the work. On the larger question of agency and
>>> images and tools, I think to describe a work as we are discussing
>>> by not talking about the software/hardware we do just create an
>>> impression of "computer as tool".
>>> 
>>> Your illustration of a painting on the wall in a museum painted
>>> centuries ago cannot be used as an example. Time is not accounted
>>> for in the same way. Leonardo and/or his helpers painted an image
>>> where time is not considered. Yes it took time to make the work
>>> but that time was singular not to be addressed again. The desire
>>> of the artist was to create the work as a singular piece that
>>> exists in time the process stops when the artist puts down the
>>> brush an says "Yep its done". Conservators exist to halt time on 
>>> such paintings, museums spend money to halt time on works.
>>> 
>>> Where as a work that exists in space and is intended to change
>>> over time is very different. Process denotes actions over time. I
>>> happened to be in Toronto a couple of weeks ago and Hans Haacke's
>>> work Ice Stick was on display, (someone mentioned Haacke's work
>>> in relation to this topic earlier). It consists of a
>>> refrigeration unit, and condensed water vapor that is in the form
>>> of a stick, for lack of a better description. the work exists in
>>> its environment and changes over time. People may look at it and
>>> call it a giant popsicle sculpture. But it cant be reduced to
>>> only one element, the popsicle cant exist without its
>>> refrigeration unit which has to be plugged in to work, and the
>>> gallery's environment. these elements are integral to the work,
>>> and cannot be seen as tools displayed on a pedestal separate from
>>> the work.
>>> 
>>> It is like the difference between the terms complicated and
>>> complexity that N. Katherine Hayles describes in her book "My
>>> Mother was a Computer: Digital Subjects and Literary Texts"
>>> 
>>> Complicated: (within machines) parts interact with each other in
>>> defined and predictable ways. reducible
>>> 
>>> Complex: (computation) many parts interacting with one another to
>>> create something different and unpredictable. non-reducible
>>> 
>>> 
>>> Erika Lincoln Electronic Media Artist Winnipeg/Manitoba/Canada 
>>> http://www.lincolnlab.net
>>> 
>>> 
>>> --- On Fri, 5/21/10, Eileen Reynolds (Asst Prof)
>>> <EReynolds at ntu.edu.sg> wrote:
>>> 
>>>> From: Eileen Reynolds (Asst Prof) <EReynolds at ntu.edu.sg> 
>>>> Subject: Re: [-empyre-] Process as paradigm To:
>>>> "soft_skinned_space" <empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au> Received:
>>>> Friday, May 21, 2010, 11:18 PM Hi Erika,
>>>> 
>>>> The image as output seems to me the most active agent because
>>>> it is out in the world communicating.   However, if one is more
>>>>  interested in the the data set being "algorithmicly" processed
>>>> through a computer, then why waste the paper to create an image
>>>> that is non active at the end?  If the production of the image
>>>> is just a remnant and record of the computer's processing, then
>>>> no, it is not an active agent, and only proof of the actively
>>>> processing computer and its ability to do something.
>>>> 
>>>> My other thought is the old classic - "the computer is just a
>>>> tool".   And since we place these tools on such a high
>>>> pedestal, perhaps the Louvre should instead display the paint
>>>> brush that Leonardo used to paint the Mona Lisa rather than
>>>> just the 30 × 20 inch remnant of the pigmented data set that he
>>>> "algorithmicly" processed through the bristles. But I'm not too
>>>> certain that would interest very many.
>>>> 
>>>> -Eileen
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> ________________________________________ From:
>>>> empyre-bounces at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au 
>>>> [empyre-bounces at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au] On Behalf Of Erika Jean
>>>> Lincoln [fur_princess at yahoo.ca] Sent: Friday, May 21, 2010
>>>> 11:38 PM To: soft_skinned_space Subject: Re: [-empyre-] Process
>>>> as paradigm
>>>> 
>>>> Hi Maria, Yann, Isn't it more precise to say that the data set
>>>> of the digital image is "algorithmicly" processed through an 
>>>> computer which leads to a different data set which is then 
>>>> represented as an image?
>>>> 
>>>> To me the image is not the active agent. Thoughts?
>>>> 
>>>> Erika Lincoln Electronic Media Artist Winnipeg/Manitoba/Canada 
>>>> http://www.lincolnlab.net
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> --- On Thu, 5/20/10, Maria Verstappen <notnot at xs4all.nl> wrote:
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>>> From: Maria Verstappen <notnot at xs4all.nl> Subject: Re:
>>>>> [-empyre-] Process as paradigm To: "soft_skinned_space"
>>>>> <empyre at gamera.cofa.unsw.edu.au>,
>>>> "Yann Le Guennec" <y at x-arn.org>
>>>>> Received: Thursday, May 20, 2010, 11:37 AM Dear Yann, In the
>>>>> context of this exhibition the notion of
>>>> "generative
>>>>> image" can be taken quite literal as a still image
>>>> that
>>>>> generates the next image in real time. Subsequently
>>>> this new
>>>>> image forms the basis for the next image, etcetera. In
>>>> case
>>>>> of a screen based work, the viewer experiences this
>>>> ongoing
>>>>> sequence as a dynamic animation. Maria
>>>>> 
>>>>> On May 19, 2010, at 10:09 PM, Yann Le Guennec wrote:
>>>>> 
>>>>>> Hello dear Empyreans,
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> systems are open; entropy is a mistake; boundaries are in
>>>>>> the mind (of the 'modelizer'=
>>>>> someone making a model);
>>>>>> every process is part of n systems; quantum physics is a
>>>>>> biface (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biface); we build
>>>>>> tools we need, to prove what we think; we use tools someone
>>>>>> built (some day), to prove
>>>> what
>>>>> we thought (some day);
>>>>>> but ... i would still like to know what is this:
>>>> a
>>>>> 'generative image';
>>>>>> http://www.laboralcentrodearte.org/en/714-catalogue
>>>>> (PDF p: 55)
>>>>>> Do you mean a picture can generate something, or,
>>>> an
>>>>> image is necessarily a mind projection ? in the
>>>> future
>>>>> (unforeseen) ?
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> best, yann
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> _______________________________________________ empyre
>>>>>> forum empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au 
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>>>> 
>>>> 
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>> 
>> Christopher Sullivan Dept. of Film/Video/New Media School of the
>> Art Institute of Chicago 112 so michigan Chicago Ill 60603 
>> csulli at saic.edu 312-345-3802 
>> _______________________________________________ empyre forum 
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