Slashdot Mirror
Open Source Art?
gz writes "The Whitney has put online an exhibit where viewers are encouraged to examine the source code of the program that generates the art, despite the fact that the majority of viewers have no idea what the code means. Projects use Java, C, Perl, Lingo, and VB."
Wasn't there a software monopoly who encouraged (after a judge told them to do so) some selected state officers to examine the source code of its operating system, despite the fact that the majority of viewers had no idea what the code means ?
... how a buffer overflow would 'look'
Time to review that code!
The writer seems to be implying that the program is generating digital modern art without any human intervention whatsoever, which is both silly and wrong
True, this implication is wrong in this context, but I hope you are not saying that modern art generation without human intervention (beyond pressing a button) is silly and wrong - it's no different than any natural system that generates "art" - think corral (or fractals, for that matter)
Robots are everywhere, and they eat old people's medicine for fuel.
Yes, but Code is NOT a paintbrush. Code is also NOT art!
C, C++ JAVA, those are the paint brushes. The output of the code is the art.
But what is the code?
It is a tiny manefestation of the artists soul. Between the paint brush and the finished art is a human. The code IS the human in a microscopic captured for. The code is written by a human and the human has imbued the code with a subset of his soul like the human would imbue the brush as he is painting. It's like an artist "Magicly" teaching the brush what to paint, then days later having the brush paint the actual canvas (if that was possible).
The code is something new. It is neither the brush, nor the art. But a tiny displased human soul, ready to render out that tiny portion of the artists whims and desires on demand.
Contrary to popular belief, coding is not all free blow-jobs and beer. Those things cost MONEY!