Randomness

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Within the visual arts, the word chance is used more than our term random. The meaning of chance in this context is more general and covers a wider range of work. In his text Chance Imagery, the conceptual artist George Brecht clarifies between two types of chance operations, “one where the origin of images is unknown because it lies in deeper-than-conscious levels of the mind, and the second where images derive from mechanical processes not under the artist’s control.” The first definition describes the work of the surrealists and abstract expressionists who allow subconscious processes to dictate the work. The second definition correlates to how we define randomness; it describes the work of the artists most relevant to our interest in 10 Print.

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In 1913, the French artist Marcel Duchamp made a strong statement with Three Standard Stoppages. He dropped three meter-long pieces of string from the height of one meter and let gravity, ??, and ?? dictate the paths downward onto a canvas. He then adhered the string and recorded the shape by tracing it onto wood and cutting it out. This act challenged the meter as a standard measurement and allowed Duchamp to construct his own standards as a parody of so-called rational science and to undermine the authority of the meter.

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In 1913, the French artist Marcel Duchamp made a strong statement with Three Standard Stoppages. He dropped three meter-long pieces of string from the height of one meter and let gravity and wind dictate the paths of the twisting string downward. He then adhered the string and recorded the shape by cutting it out of wood to make a new measurement. This act challenged the meter as a standard measurement and allowed Duchamp to construct his own standards as a parody of rational science and to undermine the authority of the meter. He wrote about the piece in 1914 that the falling thread distorts “itself as it pleases” and the “3 standard stoppages are the meter diminished.” On his use of randomness, Duchamp said, “Pure chance interested me as a way of going agains logical reality.” Duchamp was active within the Dada, and arts movement that reacted to the horrors of World War I with satire and absurdity. In the words of ??, “Dada wished to destroy the reasonable frauds of men and recover the natural, unreasonable order. Dada wished to replace the logical nonsense of the men of today with an illogical nonsense.” To Jean (Hans) Arp, a Dada artist, individual authorship was synonymous to authoritarianism and random elements were used to liberate the work.

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Duchamp was active within the Dada movement, an energy within the arts that reacted to the horrors of World War I. Many of the artists were in active combat... Rejected the ?? that brought about the war...

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Within the twentieth century, John Cage is most responsible for promoting random processes within the arts. From his point of view, random elements can remove individual bias from creation; they may be used to go beyond the limitations of the taste and bias through “chance operations”. In additional to his work as a composer following these ideas, Cage influenced generations of artists through his writing, lectures, and classes. In this text “Experimental Music”, Cage wrote, “Those involved with the composition of experimental music find ways and means to remove themselves from the activities of the sounds they make. Some employ chance operations, derived form sources as ancient as the Chinese Books of Changes, or as modern as the tables of random numbers used also by physicists in research.” [Cage 66, p. 10] [Note: Earle Brown used the following random sampling number tables: "M.G. Kendall and B. Babington Smith, A Table of Random Sampling Numbers. Tracts for Computers no. 24. (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1939)."]

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“Dada wished to destroy the reasonable frauds of men and recover the natural, unreasonable order. Dada wished to replace the logical nonsense of the men of today with an illogical nonsense.”

−

Within the 20th century, John Cage is most responsible for promoting random processes to move beyond the individuals tastes and biases of an individual. In additional to his work as a composer, he influenced generations of artists through his writing, lectures, and classes.

+

Cage's style of random composition was to create a system of parameters, then leave the results to circumstance. Cage explained, “This means that each performance of such a piece of music is unique, as interesting to its composer as to others listening. It is easy to see again the parallel with nature, for even with leaves of the same tree, no two are exactly alike.” [Cage 66, p. 11] Random components are used to transform a composition into a space of potential compositions.

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Cage: “This means that each performance of such a piece of music is unique, as interesting to its composer as to others listening. It is easy to see again the parallel with nature, for even with leaves of the same tree, no two are exactly alike.

+

Over the decades, Cage used an array of techniques to insert the unexpected into this compositions. He defines the range of techniques used by himself and his contemporaries in the 1958 lectures “Composition as Process”. MORE

+

Within the field of painting, mechanical random processes were explored for the reasons championed by Cage. The eminent contemporary painter Gerhard Richter provides a simple answer to why this is beneficial, “I'm often astonished to find how much better chance is than I am.” There's precedent for chance used within visual works dating back to collage works by Jean (Hans) Arp from 1916, but the two most relevant works to 10 Print are ?? () by Ellsworth Kelly and ?? () by François Morellet.

=== The Emergence of Randomness in Computing ===

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 Within the visual arts, the word chance is used more than our term random. The meaning of chance in this context is more general and covers a wider range of work. In his text Chance Imagery, the conceptual artist George Brecht clarifies between two types of chance operations, “one where the origin of images is unknown because it lies in deeper-than-conscious levels of the mind, and the second where images derive from mechanical processes not under the artist’s control.” The first definition describes the work of the surrealists and abstract expressionists who allow subconscious processes to dictate the work. The second definition correlates to how we define randomness; it describes the work of the artists most relevant to our interest in 10 Print.
-In 1913, the French artist Marcel Duchamp made a strong statement with Three Standard Stoppages. He dropped three  meter-long pieces of string from the height of one meter and let gravity, ??, and ?? dictate the paths downward onto a canvas. He then adhered the string and recorded the shape by tracing it onto wood and cutting it out. This act challenged the meter as a standard measurement and allowed Duchamp to construct his own standards as a parody of so-called rational science and to undermine the authority of the meter.
+In 1913, the French artist Marcel Duchamp made a strong statement with Three Standard Stoppages. He dropped three  meter-long pieces of string from the height of one meter and let gravity and wind dictate the paths of the twisting string downward. He then adhered the string and recorded the shape by cutting it out of wood to make a new measurement. This act challenged the meter as a standard measurement and allowed Duchamp to construct his own standards as a parody of rational science and to undermine the authority of the meter. He wrote about the piece in 1914 that the falling thread distorts “itself as it pleases” and the “3 standard stoppages are the meter diminished.” On his use of randomness, Duchamp said, “Pure chance interested me as a way of going agains logical reality.” Duchamp was active within the Dada, and arts movement that reacted to the horrors of World War I with satire and absurdity. In the words of ??, “Dada wished to destroy the reasonable frauds of men and recover the natural, unreasonable order. Dada wished to replace the logical nonsense of the men of today with an illogical nonsense.” To Jean (Hans) Arp, a Dada artist, individual authorship was synonymous to authoritarianism and random elements were used to liberate the work.
-Duchamp was active within the Dada movement, an energy within the arts that reacted to the horrors of World War I. Many of the artists were in active combat... Rejected the ?? that brought about the war...
+Within the twentieth century, John Cage is most responsible for promoting random processes within the arts. From his point of view, random elements can remove individual bias from creation; they may be used to go beyond the limitations of the taste and bias through “chance operations”. In additional to his work as a composer following these ideas, Cage influenced generations of artists through his writing, lectures, and classes. In this text “Experimental Music”, Cage wrote, “Those involved with the composition of experimental music find ways and means to remove themselves from the activities of the sounds they make. Some employ chance operations, derived form sources as ancient as the Chinese Books of Changes, or as modern as the tables of random numbers used also by physicists in research.” [Cage 66, p. 10] [Note: Earle Brown used the following random sampling number tables: "M.G. Kendall and B. Babington Smith, A Table of Random Sampling Numbers. Tracts for Computers no. 24. (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1939)."]
-“Dada wished to destroy the reasonable frauds of men and recover the natural, unreasonable order. Dada wished to replace the logical nonsense of the men of today with an illogical nonsense.”
-Within the 20th century, John Cage is most responsible for promoting random processes to move beyond the individuals tastes and biases of an individual. In additional to his work as a composer, he influenced generations of artists through his writing, lectures, and classes.
+Cage's style of random composition was to create a system of parameters, then leave the results to circumstance. Cage explained, “This means that each performance of such a piece of music is unique, as interesting to its composer as to others listening. It is easy to see again the parallel with nature, for even with leaves of the same tree, no two are exactly alike.” [Cage 66, p. 11] Random components are used to transform a composition into a space of potential compositions.
-Cage: “This means that each performance of such a piece of music is unique, as interesting to its composer as to others listening. It is easy to see again the parallel with nature, for even with leaves of the same tree, no two are exactly alike.
+Over the decades, Cage used an array of techniques to insert the unexpected into this compositions. He defines the range of techniques used by himself and his contemporaries in the 1958 lectures “Composition as Process”.  MORE
+Within the field of painting, mechanical random processes were explored for the reasons championed by Cage. The eminent contemporary painter Gerhard Richter provides a simple answer to why this is beneficial, “I'm often astonished to find how much better chance is than I am.” There's precedent for chance used within visual works dating back to collage works by Jean (Hans) Arp from 1916, but the two most relevant works to 10 Print are ?? () by Ellsworth Kelly and ?? () by François Morellet.
 === The Emergence of Randomness in Computing ===