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Computers and Art provides insightful perspectives on the use of the computer as a tool for artists. The approaches taken vary from its historical, philosophical and practical implications to the use of computer technology in art practice. The contributors include an art critic, an educator, a practising artist and a researcher. Mealing looks at the potential for future developments in the field, looking at both the artistic and the computational aspects of the field.
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computers second edition edited by stuart mealing & art Computers & Art Second Edition edited by Stuart Mealing intellect Bristol, UK Portland, OR, USA Second edition published in Great Britain in 2002 by Intellect, PO Box 862, Bristol BS99 1DE, UK Second edition published in USA in 2002 by Intellect, ISBS, 5824 N,E.Hassalo St, Portland, Oregon, 97213-3644, USA First edition published 1n 1997 Copyright ©2002 Intellect Ltd. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be produced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission, Consulting Editor: Masoud Yazdani Copy Editors: Holly Spradling and Wendi Momen Cover & book design: Toucan Set in Quadraat A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Electronic ISBN 1-84150-874-8 / ISBN 1-84150-062-3 Printed & bound in Great Britain by the Cromwell Press, Wiltshire Contents 5 Introduction 7 Stuart Mealing On drawing a circle 17 George Whale Why use computers to make drawings? 33 Ed Burton Representing representation: artificial intelligence and drawing 51 John Lansdown Some trends in computer graphic art 59 Jim Noble Fatal attraction: print meets computer 73 Jeremy Diggle A year and a day on the road to Omniana 81 Martin Rieser The art of interactivity: interactive installation from gallery to street 97 Paul Brown Networks and artworks: the failure of the user-friendly interface Contents 109 Joanna Buick Virtual reality and art 119 Richard Wright Visual technology and the poetics of knowledge 127 Brian Reffin-Smith Post-modem art, or: Virtual reality as Trojan donkey, or: Horsetail tartan literature groin art 143 Mike King Artificial consciousness – artificial art Computers & Art Second Edition 4 Stuart Mealing Introduction There is an undeniable frisson about juxtaposing the words ‘art’ and ‘computers’ since they stand at the gateways of seemingly opposite worlds, guardians of opposite values and standards. Their juxtaposition calls into dispute embedded notions about art, about creativity, about consciousness and thus about the human condition. For over 30 years I have been either involved with art and excited by computers or involved with computers and excited by art. I should provide a prime audience for computer art, yet have often been left curiously cold by the products of the two disciplines coming together. I would not want to compile a book documenting computer art. ‘Computers and art’, however, is an altogether more expansive subject which can look at the practice and potential of computers as tools, enablers, creators and as sources of inspiration in the field of the visual arts. The discipline is a new one; a medium perhaps still waiting for its time. As with the early years of photography, it once aped more established media and sought comfort from its own technology, but its very existence has also provoked some of the most stimulating questions of our time. Paul Davies, in the Sunday Times, quoted the