Randomness

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 the Dada musician Gabrielle Buffet-Picabia, “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.

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 the Dada musician Gabrielle Buffet-Picabia, “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.

Continuing on with the musical interpretations, it is important to mention John Cage. Within the twentieth century, John Cage is most responsible for promoting random processes within the arts. Cage was strongly influenced by Duchamp. From Cage's 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)."] 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 single composition into a space of potential compositions. Over the decades, Cage used an array of techniques to insert unexpected elements into this compositions. He defines the range of techniques used by himself and his contemporaries in the 1958 lectures “Composition as Process”. There are generally two methods for utilizing random values – using them at the time of composition to define the work, or to allow for variation while the work is performed. This second category of is most similar to 10 Print, where the random decisions are made during the programs execution, or to say it a different way, while the instructions are performed by the C64 operating system.

Continuing on with the musical interpretations, it is important to mention John Cage. Within the twentieth century, John Cage is most responsible for promoting random processes within the arts. Cage was strongly influenced by Duchamp. From Cage's 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)."] 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 single composition into a space of potential compositions. Over the decades, Cage used an array of techniques to insert unexpected elements into this compositions. He defines the range of techniques used by himself and his contemporaries in the 1958 lectures “Composition as Process”. There are generally two methods for utilizing random values – using them at the time of composition to define the work, or to allow for variation while the work is performed. This second category of is most similar to 10 Print, where the random decisions are made during the programs execution, or to say it a different way, while the instructions are performed by the C64 operating system.