Tuesday, February 10, 2015

Chance Operations

Matthew J Koehler and Punyasholke Mishra have developed Inverso, a computer program that randomly selects lines of poetry to form Haikus. Critiques question whether this form of random poetry is a true form of writing or whether the poems the program produces mean anything. One of the more “meaningful” poems Inverso produced is this one here:
    Order from chaos
Big Bang, a day of creation
Spring is coming
(Inverso, 2002)

As an emotion species, we humans get ideas when creation and life itself is questioned. When a computer program starts putting together lines about the big bang and order and chaos and new seasons of change questions arise like, what does this mean? Or what is the author's intentions? Unfortunately the poem is random it's not any different that a nother of Inverso's Haikus:
    The gypsy moths swarm
she fears the simplicy
Winter is coming
(Inverso, 2002)




Wan Chai, Joyce Yung, and Minnie Yip are the founders behind RAW: Random Art Workshop. They are based in Hong Kong and focus on organizing workshops for busy city dwellers to relax and unwind through the enjoyment and randomness that art can bring. RAW doesn't have any set system of chance that I can conclude. However, after thinking about the rituals that a business person has to go through in Hong Kong. Long hours- 6 or 7 days a week- and you're whole career feeds you and your family. Maybe taking some time at Random Art Workshop isn't such a bad idea after all. Even though the system isn't randomized, after a few years of the same job over and over again, even placing down colorful paper down on in a shadow box at random is random enough.




Remko Scha gives a lecture on the present state of artificial art. Hitting on his section of “Chance Art,” he mentions Picabia and Polke who use a grid and black and white dot system, like pixels. He also talks about the construction of random shapes and random landscapes- A project by Lévy. This draws a “map” with random coastlines. He talks about these simple systems that can be applied to produce results, but there is a “language” that they are trying to develop in order to get more. One such style of coding is Harold Cohen's AARON. It's a drawing program that tries to mimic existing artists. It can have a much richer and more flexible area to develop.

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