Using computer code as a medium for creating art
June 29 2009
Circle image by Robert Ransick, from the course website for
The Fine Art of Code.
Course description:
The Fine Art of Code
Robert Ransick
In this course we explore using computer code as a medium
for creating artwork. The focus is on the open source platform Processing-an
environment for programming images, animation and interaction. There are
readings, research and production assignments, presentations and critiques
during the course. In addition, a broad survey of artwork with computer code as
its foundation is explored.
"There's a power that's inherent in being able to write your own
software," says digital arts
faculty member Robert Ransick. As an
artist whose own work draws on a range
of media, he is well versed in programming, but "my love is of the power of
what it allows us to do—the opportunities for exploration, experimentation,
discovery. The focus in my classes is always on ideas and the creation of work
that lives within the fine arts." At the same time, he says, "skills learned
translate in many other ways, and can be used in a variety of ways."
That leaves the door open for many types of students to join
the class. "People come to this class from both sides of the field," says Sofia Barbaresco '09. "Some of us are artists
who are interested in another way to communicate artistic ideas. And there are
also straight programmers who are used to making functional programs, but are
looking for an artistic sense." Each is given the time to develop projects that
round out their abilities and ideas.
A class wiki
allowed students to view and critique each other's code. "When it comes to
acquiring new technical skills that are almost synonymous to learning a new
language, you need your peers," Ransick says. "The students were always willing
to help each other. And that kind of spirit is how you become successful with
programming languages, because you're just never going to know it all. That spirit
is the lynchpin. It really is. And that, I think, is indicative of what most
students encounter at Bennington."
A look at three students, their work, and how they used the
class:
David Selles '10
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What he studies: "Math and education."
What happened in the
class: I
wanted to explore mathematics visually—to make the abstract logic of
math more visible. Learning how to program seemed like a good medium
for bridging math and art. In the beginning we learned about
the history of computer art and its foundations in the conceptual art
movement. As it progressed, we started learning the
Processing programming language, and toward the end we spent time critiquing
everybody's work and helping each other realize the projects we were
trying to accomplish."
 David's project:
In class, we were looking at a project that Casey Reas did
for the Whitney Museum. He had several computer artists
interpret the same set of instructions, and one of the artists, Robert Hodgins, had a bunch
of these little particles that orbit around a center and explode apart
when they
touch each other. I went through his code to better understand what he
was doing, and then used the
fundamental ideas as a springboard for what I wanted to
do. In my project, there are particles with dynamics
between them: They either follow each other in a sequence or in groups,
or they'll just orbit around the mouse. For each movement, I
set up a different coloring scheme and rendering scheme, so it creates
these
different visual aesthetics."
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Sofia Barbaresco '09
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What she studies: "The
humanities. Contemporary art."
What happened in the
class: "To study art, you need to know about the process of how it's made.
[That includes] being aware of the possibilities in new technologies. I had no
idea about code before this class, so I just wanted to learn-to have access to
that. The process of making programs was really exciting for me. And we had important
discussions about how digital art functions today, its role in art."
 Sofia's project:
"I created a visualization of the electromagnetic spectrum.
I took a black-and-white stop motion animation of a girl in a kitchen stirring
a pot, and then, using code, I programmed all of these waves coming out of different
electronic objects. Eventually, they completely overwhelm the screen and take
over. We're using all these things around us that emit different kinds of
energy, and we don't really see or think about that because it's outside our
visual spectrum."
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Devin Gaffney '10
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What he studies: "I
study the intersection between computer science and political science—more
specifically, how the ‘informatization' of the world has influenced power
structures, politics, society, culture. I'm a big fan of the internet. I do a
lot of programming, data mining, taking database information and putting it to
other uses."
What happened in the
class: "Every class I take with Robert, I go in with the assumption that
I'm going to build something that I would want to see in use, out in the wild.
Inevitably, I also have to figure out how this works as a piece of art."
 Devin's project:
"I'm building a visualization system for Twitter. The
program mines Twitter for the ten most recent topics, then grabs the last 15
people who talked about those things....This is all recursive, so it kind of
folds into itself and create a trail. You search one word and then go to the
next one. It's voyeuristic and somehow profound, and a lot stranger than I
thought it would be." |
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