January 2012
3 posts
3 tags
Because beats are better when they're just a...
Skrillex: Scary Monsters and Nice Sprites. Evil commences at 00:45.
4 tags
Poke me in the other eye, please: Artists and...
Perhaps I’m in a personal info-wormhole but lately I’ve become aware of any number of articles, books and lectures explaining in gruesome detail just how unattractive being an artist is in terms of comparative job quality. The other day it was a summary on Rhizome (by John Powers and William Powhida) of a lecture Hans Abbing’ gave on artists and poverty. Abbing is the author of...
6 tags
Call: Generator.x 3.0 - from Code to Atoms
The call for participants to the Generator.x 3.0 - from Code to Atoms workshop at iMAL in Brussels next month is still open. We’ll have Makerbots, a laser cutter and a CNC mill on site to play with so if you’re interested in digital fabrication and parametric systems this should be of interest to you.
Full text and entry form can be found at:...
December 2011
4 posts
6 tags
Cellular automata as pattern generator
Working on pattern generation using cellular automata. I haven’t played with CA since 1998, so it feels pretty old school. The rulesets are hard to control, but some of the more regular ones have potential when overlaid. Adding crazy colors gives bonus points.
Clarification: These images were made by manually layering several separate runs of my CA, they’re not the result of a single...
6 tags
RibForm series
Work for a new 3D printing project, built completely in Processing with Wblut’s Hemesh library and my own Modelbuilder. Hemesh was used for the lattice structure, with the underlying structure first being built in Modelbuilder.
Most of these aren’t even printable, the final result (seen here) had to be quite solid and somewhat simplified to be guaranteed to print. The print...
4 tags
Open Objects: The Future of Things (lecture)
Lecture about the rise of digital fabrication and parametric design, looking at their implications for creative practices. Specifically, Open Source design (Makerbot and Thingiverse), generative systems and data sculpture.
Given Nov 26, 2011 at Code Camping Amsterdam, Hack de Overheid, Amsterdam
(function() { var scribd = document.createElement("script"); scribd.type = "text/javascript";...
6 tags
MBSys - new work for Montblanc
Fast Company Co.Design posted a feature yesterday about a recent project for Montblanc that I was involved in. The article focused on Onformative, showing several nice examples of their piece. But it also named me, somewhat awkward since I hadn’t published any documention and so there was no visual context.
To rectify the situation I’ve now posted some process documentation as...
November 2011
8 posts
9 tags
Death and the J2ME applet (NTLSys 1-3)
I recently posted on Flickr some images of NTLSys 1-3, a J2ME app piece I did for Nokia Trend Labs in 2007. They had been lying around on my hard drive, and even though this is hardly a major work (I do still think it’s somewhat charming) I still thought they were worth archiving permanently.
Then it struck me: This piece will be gone forever in just a year or two. I can still run it on...
7 tags
Concept vs. Form, that old chestnut
This post is a response to a longer thread on Google+ between Ben Bogart and myself. Specifically, the following is specifically a response to his long post titled Is generative art conceptual or formal? (the post is not currently public, but if you’re on G+ you might be able to see it).
I don’t believe in segregating work into concept or form camps. But such a division exists de facto....
7 tags
WatchBeautiful rules: Generative models of creativity
This is a video of a talk I gave in 2007 at Olhares de Outono at the Portuguese Catholic University in Porto. It’s interesting to see how my spiel has evolved from this point.
3 tags
Random Awesome meetup, Nov 16 →
Just announced another Random Awesome meetup in Williamsburg for this Wednesday, come if you’re in the area! There are worse things in life than meeting friendly art+tech people over a cold beer.
Random Awesome:
Time for another Random Awesome meetup, scheduled for this Wednesday at Night of Joy in Williamsburg. You know the drill: Freaks, geeks and artistes - we take all comers. No...
Artist: Zimoun
Unsurprisingly, I’m a big fan of Swiss sound artist Zimoun. His artistic vision is one of clarity, based on kinetic mechanisms that appear at first glance single-mindedly simple, yet once turned on give rise to surprisingly complex outcomes. His assemblages of primitive motors and analogue mechanisms produce unpredictable behaviors that appear almost organic, even though their...
9 tags
“Through the repetition of simple rectangular bars that cross over at different...”
– Stefanie Kogler, exhibition review: ‘Abstraction-Creation- Post-War Geometric Abstract Art from Europe and South America’, Austin Desmond Fine Art, Bloomsbury, London, 8th September – 6th October 2010
Anecdotes on seeing vs. reading, plus some musings...
Whenever I read “serious” texts it makes me feel like a cheat for not reading them more often or for being ignorant of so many great texts. Reading is a creative practice all unto itself, never mind writing. I rarely find time for either, it’s either the ADD or the fact that I am committed to a completely parallel “reading” of images and spatial structures. That...
October 2011
8 posts
Interview: How the European Festival Circuit... →
Kyle Chayka (who writes for ARTINFO) interviewed me about differences between the Euro and US media art scenes. My response was to break it down in an almost Marxist analysis, following the money to see what funding and the festival circuit means for the European artists.
My main (subjective) contention is that the festivals are great for emerging artists, not so much for mid-career ones. The...
Wieden+Kennedy: Why We're Not Hiring Creative...
Wieden+Kennedy (via Creative Technology Director +Igor Clark ) says they’re not hiring Creative Technologists in a somewhat holier-(or-at-least-smarter)-than-thou blog post. Here’s the first paragraph:
I’ve pretty much had it with the term “Creative Technology”. I’m a “Creative Technology Director” myself, and even I’m over it: already it...
6 tags
Book: NEW ART/SCIENCE AFFINITIES
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Published by the CMU STUDIO for Creative Inquiry and the Miller Gallery, “NEW ART/SCIENCE AFFINITIES” is a new book created in a “book sprint” by some interesting thinkers on the intersection between art and science. I’m pleased to say that it features myself as well as a slew of people one should be...
“Was Nicholas Negroponte, one of the intellectual fathers of cyber-utopianism,...”
– Morozov, Evgeny. The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of Internet Freedom. New York: Public Affairs, 2011. (via carvalhais)
4 tags
Net Art 2.0 - So What?
Somewhat inflammatory presentation for my “Deathmatch” with Lindsay Howard at Flux Factory, Oct 8, 2011. I’m not usually this confrontational, keep in mind it was supposed to be a deathmatch after all. I don’t mean to denigrate any of the artists mentioned, they were just unfortunate enough to end up getting mentioned as part of my efforts to hammer out a dialectical...
3 tags
Linkli.st: Amazing artists
Did I mention I’m a HUGE fan of http://linkli.st by Konst & Teknik & Martin Ström? The embed function alone is genius (although it needs a tiny bit of CSS hacking to work properly with Tumblr.)
Here is a list of artists I check out whenever I’m feeling jaded and bored of art. It cures that boredom fast.
4 tags
Things I've learned from disagreeing about (Media)...
Don’t do it. Count to 10. Read XKCD. Don’t do it.
Art is more fun to make than talk about. If you’re an artist you’re better off working. It’s not like there are enough hours in the day.
If you must discuss art, do it only with people you 90% agree with. It’s more productive that way.
Being pragmatic rarely pays off in a debate. Who cares that you might be...
Number 5 is Alive
After spending more time writing recently I decided to activate this Tumblr blog as a place to store thoughts and references. I miss blogging, and Twitter or Google+ don’t scratch that itch. So, a Tumblr. For now.
December 2008
1 post
November 2008
1 post
September 2008
2 posts
The Turin shroud of mobile phones
Faded ghost of mobile phone on jeans.
Mark Wagner Smoke in my dreams and art →
Mark Wagner makes wonderful collages by cutting up dollar bills and using them to create textures and collages.