September 2009
8 posts
a comparison of artistic structure and ants...
“Additionally, all artistic structure is essentially polyphonic; it evolves not in a single line of thought, but in several superimposed strands at once.”
from The Hidden Order of Art” by Anton Ehrenzweig
The idea of maze or trails of options is an interesting comparison to what it is ants do best, forage. Ants are fairly simple creatures who manage to complete ultimately...
“An artist in a sense does not differentiate experience into objects. Everything...”
– from Fragments of a Conversation by Robert Smithson from The Writings of Robert Smithson edited by Nancy Holt
I want to come back to this quote and write about the relation of this concept to one prevalent in emergence theory: langton’s ant
“In particular, it examines the concept of emergence, looking at its historical...”
– Found here.
From the abstract for the paper Art, Emergence, and the Computational Sublime by Jon McCormack and Alan Dorin… next on my reading list.
LINK: audio from WNYC's radiolab on emergence →
I first listened to this episode of radio lab probably three years ago and have since heard it more than a dozen times and it remains my favorite. Included in the episode is a bit about fireflies in Thiland which sync their flashing until they are all in unison. Order it seems created out of nothing.
Random flight of Pteroptyx males, taken from firefly trees in Thailand and releases in a...
LINK: PBS video on emergence →
The theory of emergence has been on my mind since the first class and I think it is probably the best place to begin my journal. The way that something huge can appear out of something tiny is completely fascinating.
The transcript of the video can also be found here.
getting started
In planning to start my visual verbal journal for Metaphorical Aspects of Contemporary Art, starting a separate back up journal seemed like a good idea. So, this will be that journal—-a place to generally gather information about generally everything. The task at hand is to take back Art History and make informed decisions for ourselves as opposed to memorizing what it is Art Historians have...