Will Wright and Brian Eno: Play with Time.

Excellent seminar on Generative Systems.

The Beauty of Chaos

Something both wonderful and sad happened this week. I began seeing patterns much more prominent and awe inspiring than ever before. I found myself just staring at things, and became completely fascinated with a fractural cauliflower (well that’s what I called it) that I didn’t even want to eat because of its swirling complicated patterns and intense beauty.



I also watched some amazing cloud formations and tripped over a recycling bin whilst taking photos, due to being totally absorbed. I seemed to be noticing the magnificence of nature in so much more detail more than usual!




The sad part was the vote on the rise in tuition fees that was passed :-( I felt so sorry for the future generations of students wanting to study and not being able to, due to the high costs and huge debts they will face. At the moment this country seems to be going downhill fast, and I can only see things getting more chaotic. Due to thinking about this I stumbled across a book: Chaos Theory Tamed, by Garnett P. Williams. I started reading some of it, but then one thing led to another and before I knew it found a video on Chaos Theory on the internet, called: The Secret Life of Chaos. This had an amazing effect on me it was as if everything that I’d recently been thinking about this week had been put together in a video. Even the fractural cauliflower was in it, and I found out it’s either called a Romanesco Broccoli or a Roman Cauliflower. The video below is an excerpt from the documentary talking about Benoit Mandelbrot a mathematician. This clip explores how natural fractals in the world, form the shapes of mountains, coastlines and river basins; the structures of plants, blood vessels and lungs. It's a really fascinating documentary.

Discussing Project Proposals

This week we mainly talked about project proposals and blogs. Andy recommended two sites to view.The first link gives advice on academic skills and time management etc. Click Here

The second link explains how to define a research investigation : Click Here


I have also been looking at MADA blogs from previous students. Jonathan recommended these a while back and they are both really good:

http://esmuto.wordpress.com

http://qunud.wordpress.com

Last week I ordered a book called: Getting started with Processing by Casey Reas and Ben Fry. It hasn’t arrived yet, but hopefully now that the snow has thawed it will turn up soon. During the chat session Osiris mentioned that he thought it would be possible to learn Processing in approximately 2 months. I was really pleased to hear this. Andy also mentioned that Processing is actually a Java based programme – it uses the Java runtime engine on the PC. Plus I found out that OOP stands for Object Oriented Programming: Click Here

In addition I got some feedback about my Generative Characters and Critique Videos from the group. All was good. This was a relief as I was slightly concerned someone may be offended :-)

Critique 1

Here’s a short video of my critique. I have used toy characters from my previous experiment as avatars for the people in my group crit :-)

Generated Characters (Experiment)

This is my first very basic attempt at a generated process. The characters are purely fictional and it is merely a coincidence if they bear any resemblance to the tutors and students on my course :-)

I started by finding some small toys and placed them all in a line.  I then put all the names of the tutors and students on my course  in a box, and then individually pulled one name out of the box. Each name was to given to the next toy in line. I then filmed the characters with different backgrounds. Next week I intend to generate a musical excerpt for each character.

Here’s the video of characters so far:

Bill Viola Exhibition Feature

I found this brilliant website about Bill Viola's work. It has video clips, photos, interviews and goes into detail about the making of the work Click here

Bruce Sterling talks about Generative Art

Part 1



Part 2



Part 3



On the Fabrica Workshops Website there's also a really interesting interview with Bruce Sterling by Andy Cameron Click here

White Night Festival, Brighton 2010: Antigravity.

White Night is one of my favourite free festivals in Brighton. It takes place every year at the end of October to coincide with the ending of British Summer time. At night the streets come alive with a variety of entertainment. My favourite art work this year was an installation by Brighton based artist Steve Geliot collaborating with JD Beauvallet, Andre Walker and the art department of Durrington High School.

Tilted: Antigravity.
I filmed just a few short clips of this event as it went on for hours.




When I first saw Antigravity from a distance it looked like a UFO hovering above Brighton’s City College Car Park. On closer inspection it appeared to be a huge balloon wearing a skirt, which was reminiscent of Marilyn Monroe’s iconic skirt-blowing scene in the film Seven Year Itch. The huge balloon was lifted into the air by a crane. Projected onto it appeared to be random images which danced in time with the music. As the night went on more people gathered and danced underneath. The atmosphere was quite magical and I thought this was by far the best event at the festival.

I would call the process of Antigravity to be in the field of generative art. The whole set up appeared to be a system with an autonomous factor. The balloon attached to the crane would be the controlled planned aspect. The projected images appeared to be random, but I didn't know if they were programmed to be random, or if they were on a loop. However the wind blowing both the balloon and skirt could be seen as an autonomous element, though arguably this could also be seen as an external system in place. Yet since the external system was an unknown factor (it could have been raining with no breeze) so I think this process could possibly be called generative art!

Brian Eno "77 Million Paintings"

Brian Eno talks about his artwork: 77 Million Paintings.

Part 1




Part 2





7 More Hours in 77 Million Paintings (2008.03.16) from Pitch Bend on Vimeo.

Project Proposal 2

Individualism or Mechanism?

Primary Aims

• To create a video installation that explores the transformation of individuality within the conglomerate, by exploring the making of the work using a process called generative art.

Secondary Aims

• To question the aspects of individualism/mechanism within my work (this may change depending on the perspective).                                                                                      

Objectives

             ·      To research the methods and processes that may contribute to the making of 
           generative art.

             ·       To explore and create art using the process generative art.       

Definition

·         Generative Art encompasses any art practice where the artist creates a process. This may be in the form of natural language rules, for instance: a computer program, machine or other mechanism, which is then set in motion with some degree of autonomy that contributes to the end result

Key words:

·          Generative Art, Systems, Interconnectivity, Individuality.

Methodology:


My methodology for this project will be studio practice interlaced with the            following:

·         Visual Research

·         Contextual Research

·         Subject Research/Technique Research

·         Reflective Research

Visual research would consist of taking photographs/video clips and drawing.

Contextual research would be to look at key artists that relate to my project which so far are Bill Viola and Amy Stacey Curtis. Both of these artists explore issues relating to interconnectivity, natural cycles, individuality, movement and repetition. Also Brian Eno’s installation called ‘77 Million Paintings’ reflects notions of individuality and transformation within a collective. I will continue to expand upon contextual research throughout the course and contact the most prominent artist or artists that relates to my work, and ask if I can interview them. I will also visit exhibitions, galleries and museums.

Subject research would be to explore methods and practices relating to generative art. Since the subject of my question and method of making the art simultaneously will play a major part in answering my question, I will be exploring different systems and theories incorporated within generative art. I will also experiment and make my own systems that I will integrate within my studio practice.


Reflective research would consist of all the relevant information gathered to write my paper, which would then lead on to writing the reflective paper. This would contain all the information gathered from all the research sections, along with reflection on blog entries to create my artwork for the final project. 

Symposium 1

Here’s a short video of my MADA project proposal. 

I knew my proposal needed refining but it wasn’t until after making this short video that it occurred to me what I needed to change.

Project Proposal 1

Individualism or Mechanism?
My aims for this project are to create a video installation that explores the transformation of individuality within the conglomerate. I am also interested in how the notion of individualism prevails within a system? Key words and interests lie in: transformation, interconnectivity, natural cycles, juxtaposition, cityscapes and reflections. This work would consist of a digital video projection installation. I would like to experiment making a 2d video collage which would then be projected onto a 3d sculptural form.

My methodology for this project will be studio practice interlaced with the following:

• Visual research 
• Contextual research 
• Subject research 
• Technique research
• Reflective research


Visual research would consist of taking photographs/video clips and drawing.

Contextual research would be to look at key artists that relate to my project which so far are Bill Viola and Amy Stacey Curtis. Both of these artists explore issues relating to interconnectivity, natural cycles, individuality, movement and repetition. Also Brian Eno’s installation called ‘77 Million Paintings’ reflects notions of individuality and transformation within a collective. I will continue to expand upon contextual research throughout the course and contact the most prominent artist or artists that relates to my work, and ask if I can interview them. I will also visit exhibitions, galleries and museums.

Subject research would be to explore certain aspects of sociology by looking at individuality and societal structures and how they may reflect within the natural environment. This would also contain looking at some of the cultural and technological developments in contemporary society and how this affects the individual. I also will be exploring earth sciences by looking at repetitively, transformations, systems and natural cycles.

Technique research would include exploring new techniques within editing software, use of lighting effects and using new software and programmes.

Reflective research would consist of all the relevant information gathered to write my paper, which would then lead on to writing the reflective paper. This would contain all the information gathered from all the research sections, along with reflection on blog entries to create my artwork for the final project. 

History and rational of my work

History and rationale of my work:

I’ve always been fascinated by the visual effect of movement whether it be from human made mechanisms or movement within our natural environment. Due to this interest I simultaneously began to explore kinetics by attempting to make remote controlled sculptures and learn more about the cultural and technological developments in contemporary society. This subject gradually developed and led onto investigating aspects of the Posthuman, which was the basis for my BA dissertation:

http://www.kayjohns.net/dissertation.pdf

I found this topic to be both fascinating and scary at the same time, so my studio work began to be centred on the contradictions I was feeling. After I finished my dissertation, my research led into other areas within biotechnology, where I researched genetically modified organisms and artificial life forms. Again my studio work was based on contradictions. I wanted viewers to feel what I was feeling. My final work for my degree show consisted of an indoor kinetic installation titled: Twitter (based on the idea of genetically modified crops). An outside kinetic installation titled: Xenogenic, and a video exploring the evolution of Xenogenic.

Twitter consisted of 96 kinetic, plant-like geometric coloured straws, growing out of compost on pink paper plates.

Whilst the happy humorous visual element may strike you first. The sounds of the ticking clock mechanisms used to move the plants along with the uniform positioning of the plates in rows, gives a rather unnerving impression. The lighting in this installation was extremely important to enhance the moving shadows which also laid the path for the sinister undercurrents to emerge.

The installation Xenogenic, was outside in the college grounds, it consisted of three circles cut into the ground. This also was based on the idea of a genetically modified crop experiment, only instead of growing crops I was growing artificial manufactured life forms:

The video of Xenogenic explored the evolution of the artificial life forms:

I was and still am really happy with the outcome of both installations and the video. They all expressed the emotions that I wanted to at the time, but on reflection, it has left me asking more questions. For instance the orderly rows of plates with the different sized geometric kinetic straws, all moving at slightly different angles, also expresses a form of individuality, along with Xenogenic and the evolution of artificial life forms. This was not my focus of expression at the time, but it’s definitely an important aspect of this work, which I now feel compelled to explore further in my MA.