Analysis Of The Works Of Art In Which The Technology Is Used

Introduction

“I was always try to do art, building towards the future. ” Ernest Edmond said this, when he was interviewed by Franco in 2017. Creating deterministic systems to produce art works, was always his main interest in his career as an artist. By the invention of computer, he began to create his digital art works using computer as ‘a tool’ and in his earliest work as ‘an artistic generative system’. He is an artist and theorist from United Kingdom and through the course of his career, he produced several variations on this subject. The two of the digital art works which I am going to discuss in this essay are: ‘Nineteen, Constructed relief’ dates from 1968–1969. This piece-which is actually a “series”- is the first work designed with the aid of programming. The second piece is ‘DC_Release’ from 2007. This is in fact a multichannel, generative audio-visual piece which is presented by Ernest Edmond and multidisciplinary artist, Mark Fell. By looking at Edmond’s creations, from its origins to the later developments using creative technology, this essay will study a number of interlinked themes that contribute creating these two unique creations of this artist, “Nineteen” and “DC Release” and will compares these two works in terms of technology application process in art. These interlinked themes are the systems art, computational and digital art, practical and also theoretical developments in “generative art”.

The process which results in production of each one of these two art pieces, and the reason why these have been produced with a specific method would definitely help in terms of understanding these art works and understand the similarities and differences.

Nineteen

The series of Nineteen is a digital inkjet print (Height: 51. 2, width: 68. 6 cm) which constitutes twenty distinct colorful square printed pieces. Ernest Edmond started to use a computer in his art work in 1968, when he wrote a program that searched for an arrangement, a layout, of a given set of picture elements. In fact, he created a series which constituted twenty individual paintings which then he printed those. What happened was, each time that he arranged those pieces, he was quite unsatisfied with the result. He encountered a problem with the logic that was involved finding sets of numbers that exhibited certain conditions. The issue was in fact various axioms were independent by demonstrating that values existed that showed that no one of them could be derived from the others. It is worth noting that during the 1970s, most of the works were either concerned with the implications of the notion of computation or with the application of systems approaches to the construction of art works.

In his paper with Boden, Edmond explains how the program finally helped to discover the sets of numbers which he was looking for. In his opinion, computer was used to help him to solve a problem in a non-computing domain, the computer itself was not part of the solution.

DC_Release

DC_Release, is the more recent art work of Edmond and Fell. “DC_Release is a live performance which involves semi-improvised musical performances where they built the software for a piece during performance from a blank slate using the Impromptu environment. The music created by aa-cell, an Australian-based live coding duo, Andrew Brown and Andrew Sorensen, - includes elements of electroacoustic sound art, minimalism and electronic dance music”. Ernest Edmond and Mark Fell gave the first performance of DC_Release at the Experimental Media Series event, at the Corcoran Gallery, washinton DC. The scene lasted fifteen minutes and thirty-three seconds. Throughout this time various sets of similar cells with constant changing colors were displayed with synthetic sounds. “There was no mathematical relationship between the images and the sound, in fact these two elements presented alongside one another”.

Similarities as digital artworks

These two art works, Nineteen and DC_Release, both are digital arts, since the digital art is a vast field includes various forms of artworks based on the level of technology usage. Both Nineteen and DC_Release display abstract compositions in variety of colors. Cristian paule in “Digital Art” explains that “A notable characteristic of digital images that focus on aspects of encoding and visualization is that the process and meaning of an image do not always reveal themselves on the visual level but often rely on eternal contextual information to help ‘explain’ the work”. This is undoubtedly true about both Nineteen and the DC_Release, because both of them have a noteable relation to the process which they have been made and with place and time in which they have been displayed for the audience.

Another similar element in these two works of Edmond is the constant usage of square forms and lines (usually vertical, horizontal lines). Edmond himself explains his tendency towards the square forms in an interview: “…I’m just touching the surface of the implications of the square. ” He continues “If you look at the depth which I am trying to look at every precise element of my work, and then maybe it is not so hard to see how using for example a curve could be almost impossibly difficult for to deal with, with the same degree of attention or If you like obsessiveness”.

It is clear that the main similarity between both of the art works is that they are systematized and structured kind of art. As Edmond describes Nineteen -in the same interview- that when he wrote a program to solve his problem for Nineteen, he emphasized on the matter: “that meant writing the rules. That meant being specific about that ‘what rules satisfy me!’. That was the beginning of the rest of my artistic life”. In fact his art in this new path, significantly evolved and resulted in creation of art works such as ‘DC_Release’ (2007). Creating art through the deterministic systems were at the core of the Nineteen and also DC_Release, although in case of the ‘DC_Release performance’, the computational systems’s role has gone beyond ‘being only a systematic assistance’. Furthermore, Nineteen and DC_Release both are in the same category of the art works, which technology mediated, such as film and photography, where -according to Christian Paule – “the individuality and voice of an artist does not manifest itself in a direct physical intervention” and by categorizing them this way, no one can consider these art works to have less personality and having so-called ‘Mark of the artist’ than a traditional form of art works. What is more, both art works in Nineteen, the arranging process is the computational and encoding system which works on behalf of the artist. DC_Release is even far more complicated systematic art which the whole structure of the work is based on the algorithm. Nevertheless, IN both art works, audiences are not aware of these process nor about the algorithmic rules of the work. However, according to Edmond, those rules are not for to be discover by the audiences.

Rules in algorithmic forms are artistic decisions of the artist, who creates the system and that system obeys those rules in both forms of technology applications in Nineteen and also in DC_ Release. It is true that both art works require Audience’s full attention, to perceive the effect of the art work and surely just like any other art digital works, audience cannot distinguish the seamless combination of art forms and the level of technology application in the art work. It is a matter of importance to notice that, Algorithm which have been used in order to generate the final work of Nineteen created a closed system. Algorithm also has been used in production of DC_Release, although the application is quite different which it will be discussed later in this essay.

Differences as digital artworks

Ernest Edmond exhibited DC_Release with Mark fell, using algorithm to create their collaborative art work. “The whole underlying structures of DC_Release can be described in computational terms. The algorithms create the work whilst, of course, the artist creates the algorithms. In terms of differences between algorithm application and The use of randomness in the simulation of creativity in Nineteen and DC_Release, according to the article “The system of Nineteen is completely self-contained and has no exchange with any other system and has no exchange with the outside world. Artist has not added calls to random number generators into their algorithms so that the resulting works are predictable or are different each time the algorithm is run. The motives vary, but include the idea of simulating ‘creative’ interventions and simulating interchange with a world outside the algorithm”. But DC_Release as an interactive software with an open system, allows for the creation and manipulation of simultaneous visuals and sound in real time, which is interactive. The artists, Edmond and Mark Fell have explored possibilities in the simultaneous construction and interconnection of image and sound in their collaboration for DC_Release.

In contrast with Nineteen, DC_Release is a dynamic medium and can react to the continues fluctuation of data and also real-time transmission of data. What art digital art such as DC_Release presents according to Paule is that “these works expand the notion of the art object in the digital age, maintaining aspects of the object and at the same time transforming it into a changing, time-based structure”. DC_Release deals with re-contextualization as a digital art medium and deals with information. The information is received through the sensitive sensors, and could be infinitely developed, recycled, and reproduced in different contexts- even as a result of recombination, new ideas could be breed. The “The recontextualization of information in various relational combinations is inherently connected to the logic of the data base”. However, the main difference between DC_Release and Nineteen, is that the first one is ‘software art’ but nineteen is not. However, the Nineteen as one of the forms of digital art uses code and algorithms at some level. But as Paule has mentioned in his book ’Digital Art’: “The term ‘software art’ is usually applied to projects that have been written from scratch by artists”. Moreover, since code is considered as the medium, even the codes just like old tools ‘paint and canvas’, in case of DC_Release - have been created by the artist through the technology”. On the contrary Nineteen, basically constitutes of colors which have been painted on a paper by Edmond himself, and then he printed them. Edmonds wanted the colors to appear smoothly on the surface to create “clean” finish so he somehow sprayed the paint, rather than apply it with a brush.

At the end, although what he programmed as an arranging tool, was definitely related to aesthetic aspect of the work, but still it does not make nineteen a ‘software art’. In oppose to Nineteen, Dc_Release is a ‘generative art’ by definition. Some of the characteristics of DC_Release which makes it a generative art are: being dynamic, having characteristics of recontexualization, being a chaotic system which produced logical unpredictable results based on an algorithm. By looking at artist works during the years, many of them deals with systematic arts and not all of them were necessarily high-tech as the generative arts are not necessarily high tech. However, Edmond was always looking forward to new advancement in technology which would enable him to develop his ideas about ‘creating a systematic digital art’. The idea of creating a computer-generating system which can work independently and make artistic decisions. Although even in his recent work, DC_Release, the artist himself is the one who made the very first aesthetic decisions by creating an algorithm. The software only follows those rules to create a performance with sounds, colors and lines but it might surprise the artist sometimes. The since DC_Release is a generative art, the rules which have been applied in this work are constructive in addition to a relation to mathematical logic. And finally these rules in DC_Release provides a process which results in a desired outcome. This is actually how Edmond expresses generative art.

I should also state that, in DC_release unlike Nineteen, the artist instead of focusing on the underlying rules, concentrates on the main structure of the production. This is “generative art” that provides the artists with this opportunity to concentrate on the structure and artistic decisions making, as oppose to only paying attention to the surface. This approach fits entirely within Edmonds’ tradition. As for him the rules within a system have been always the main theme of his art. According to a simple and basic definition of generative art work which has been given by Edmond: ‘A basic definition of a computer-generated art is the artwork results from some computer program being left to run by itself, with zero interference from the human artist’. This definition completely can be applied for DC_Release performance. In a contrary for the production of Nineteen, Edmond has used a computer program to solve his problem at only one point in the process of art work production. Simply, He has arranged pieces afew times himself before using a computer, but then he decided to use a programming to reach a desired composition. This means Nineteen could have happened without technology’s participation. In creation of Nineteen technology has been used more as a tool to help artist to do a task which was not impossible to do without technology interruption. Interestingly, Edmond mentioned in his interview that at a time he was working on Nineteen, there was a serious limitation in terms of accessing to computers. Edmond had three hours to find the solution with the aid of computer. He actually couldn’t find a solution within given time. So he had to do the last equations himself. However, this attempt was a turning point in his career as an artist, and from that experience he only concentrates on creating deterministic systematic art. DC_ Release as a generative work of art contrasting Nineteen, has a complex system includes artificial intelligence, it deals with interactivity at some level. Furthermore it involves with dynamic images that are closely synchronized to electronic rhythms. In addition, the most vital component for every generative art and also for DC_Release is the algorithm. These rules which have been mentioned are manifested as algorithms which is a significant component in digital art. It is true that Edmond has used a kind of algorithm as a part of the process of the Nineteen production. But this usage of algorithm was considerably insignificant

. Another characteristic of DC_Release which make it different from Nineteen is that this live audio-visual generative performance can have a participatory and artistic role in the performance as an A. R which produces a time-based art work in front of the audience’s eyes. In fact, the audio system of Fell and the Color and lines of Edmond enable DC_Release to be a system that is more of a performer than a tool for a performer to use. To conclude, Ernest Edmond used the computer in the production of graphic images. He let the computer make the decisions in terms of rearranging the pieces in series of the “Nineteen”, and then he printed the result through the machine. By doing this he proved the role of computer as an assistant and a tool for an artist, or some one might say a problem solver. But in the process of production of DC_Release Edmond with collaboration with Mark Fell created a computer-generated artist, an artificial intelligent system and stablished a new role for their generative system as an art performer. ConclusionNew media forms do not come from nothingness. The new media forms and old media forms constantly borrow from each other in terms of ‘content’ and ‘form’. What happens is called a constant re-fashioning in addition to the socioeconomic exchanges.

In terms of creation of these two art works, the same reasoning can be applied. The idea of an interactive and generative system with baby steps of Nineteen begins and results in the creation of DC_Release. By the beginning the twenty-one century many generative art works have evolved to be extremely interactive also by using sound and image sensor systems. These interactive arts mainly value long term effect and influencing over short term reactions. This resulted in emergence of Form series. “The early concerns of Communication Games, were revived to combine with Shaping Forms into the distributed interactive systems, Cities Tango. New work also included collaboration with Mark Fell on a series of performances integrating sound and image. ” What was happening in our century in art, also interests Edmond at the same time.

Consequently, Nineteen and DC_Release in spite of their many differences, originally come from the same idea and have many similar characteristics. The very idea of reflecting to the world we live in as an artist. Given the world we live in, the recognition of the nature as a chaotic and dynamic system, and the very fast changing relationship of human and technology and artificial intelligence, It is logical and correct to say that the generative digital arts are the answers, and in this case in my essay both Nineteen and DC Release are in the same track to the future of the art world.