Regularity

In the 1960s and 70s, artists moved away from the raw emotion of abstract expressionism, the dominant movement of the 1950s. Newer movements such as op-art and minimalism, and the continued line of constructivism in Europe engendered a body of rational, calculated visual art that utilized even spacing and grids to define order.

[Frank Stella, Ad Reinhart, Carl Andre, Donald Judd, Dan Flavin. In Europe, Max Bill, Karl Gerstner, Bridget Riley, Victor Vasarely ]

These visual works arose from earlier lines of visual exploration. Within the context of the grid, Dutch pioneers Piet Mondrian (dates) and Theo Van Doesburg (dates) set the precedent for abandoning representation and even the abstration of Vallily Kandinsky for aesthetic production through rigid, regular grids.

(The grid constructed through 10 PRINT is rotated 45 degrees to add to the dynamism of the structure. This was explored by both Van Doesbur g and Mondrian. )

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While the 10 PRINT program came out of the computer culture, but it has an uncanny visual resemblance to prior works of twentieth century art. The earliest related work we've tracked down is by Paul Klee, a Bauhaus professor and eminent artist. In his influential short book Pedagogical Sketchbook, Klee discusses… In ?? he implemented these ideas ??

In 1968, the American conceptual artist Sol LeWitt starting making drawing directly on walls, rather than on paper or canvas that would be placed on the wall. In this return to the scale of frescos, his drawings within grids integrated into architecture to transform the space. His Wall Drawing 291 from 1976 is a striking work, with a strong similarity to 10 PRINT. Instead of the binary decision within 10 PRINT, LeWitt's drawing allows for horizontal and vertical lines, to create four choices for each grid element. Also like 10 PRINT, LeWitt's work is encoded as an algorithm. Unlike 10 PRINT, the instructions are in English, rather than BASIC:

291. A 12” (30cm) grid covering a black wall. Within each 12” (30cm) square, a vertical, horizontal, diagonal right or diagonal left line bisecting the square. All squares are filled. (The direction of the line in each square is determined by the draftsman.)

This grid-based wall drawing wasn't an isolated work within LeWitt's output. He created dozens of similar drawings, each with slightly different rules and allowing for varied lines including arcs and dotted lines.

Francois Molnar, a ?? and the husband of artists Vera Molnar (see p. ?? Note: we need to insert her within the Random chapter)

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All of these works discussed are fundamentally different from 10 PRINT because they are static. In the next section, we'll introduce another group of precedent for 10 PRINT related to its temporal and generative properties.