[-empyre-] glitch device

[Julian Oliver]

..on Sun, Dec 04, 2011 at 11:29:52PM +0000, James Morris wrote:
> 
> i used to waver between art and programming but recently have been
> programming much more than making art.
> 
> so as a programmer, a glitch is a bad thing, something to remove, we
> seek defined behaviour within expected parameters etc.
> 
> the likenesses of the glitch in art aren't really glitches but
> defined behaviour within expected parameters. artistic devices for the
> telling of the story; the finger print database searching software in
> CSI where rather than being presented with a progress meter we see each
> finger print the software is attempting to match against flash before
> our eyes...
> 

Very well put! I find it incredible that the emulation/fetishism of glitch is
still rampant in electronic music and electronic art; glitch-making plugins in
music sequencers, glitchy flash movies, glitch-alike PD and Max MSP
performances. It really is a great example of Baudrillard's 'Becoming Null' in
the software arts.

A glitch is not an aesthetic artifact (let alone distinctly visual or audible
phenomena) but an unanticipated rupture within a logical structure; they are
valuable because they express volatility within the inner workings of the system
in use.

Perhaps we should talk about 'glitch' (in the original sense) and 'gl1tch', in
its prepared, self-conscious sense.

-- 
Julian Oliver
http://julianoliver.com
http://criticalengineering.org