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Andy Warhol was perhaps joking (or maybe not) when he said: 'I think everybody should be a machine'. The thing about machines is that high performance is often associated with them, the dictionary definition of performance includes what machines do so perhaps this is all a redundant discussion. B Sent from my BlackBerry smartphone from Virgin Media -----Original Message----- From: Victoria Bradbury <[log in to unmask]> Sender: "Curating digital art - www.crumbweb.org" <[log in to unmask]> Date: Mon, 17 Mar 2014 13:25:42 To: <[log in to unmask]> Reply-To: Victoria Bradbury <[log in to unmask]> Subject: Re: [NEW-MEDIA-CURATING] [NEW-MEDIA-CURATING] Can non-human entities perform? Hi List, Thanks to all for weighing in on these recent questions (and please continue!). Roger, I agree that differentiating between living and non-living is impossible, and I appreciate Jack's comment that those who do separate the machine from the human may be more afraid of the development of technology than those who don't. So Jack brings up fear, an emotion, and affect, and this makes me wonder about emotion and code. GH says that non-human entities (machines?) can't make art... But can "they" make a joke? We know that code can invoke fear, but can it make us laugh? Jeff Crouse, who collaborates with respondent Stephanie Rothenberg works with code and humour. I would be interested to hear what the list has to say about fear or humour in relation to code. LOL Victoria On Mon, Mar 17, 2014 at 1:06 PM, G.H. Hovagimyan <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > On Mar 17, 2014, at 4:52 AM, roger malina <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > > > > > in this frame- i want to argue that the codes of simulations do 'perform' > > and of course the whole field of artificial life art explores this ( the > VIDA > > competition is 15 years old this year- a teenager ! > > > > Hi List & Roger, > Taking a hint from you. Code is an extension of human thinking. It's like > a score for a symphony. The human mind that wrote the code may be thought > of as "the composer." When a symphony is performed you have musicians and > you have the conductor. > You also have the audience. The conductor listens to the way the musicians > perform the work and makes sure they are on tempo and on time. He/She also > can interpret the work according to the way in which He/She feels it should > be played. There's another part to music an that is the live performance. > The audience focuses their hearing and seeing on different performers. > They feel the human effort to play the work. They understand and hear the > nuances and mannerisms of the players. You might be able to write the > algorythm to make all these subtle variations occur but the audience will > simply say that sounds like a performance. They know the difference > between live and simulation. Jaron Lanier's book, Who Owns the Future > talk about how the human effort is the basis for translation software. > This software is now available and it devalues the work of the translators. > It's putting them out of work. So the larger issue in art has always been > whether it can be simulated and whether this devalues or obsoletes artists. > This get back to the idea in art of form vesus content. Content, theme, > emotion, human life and perception are at the core of all art making. You > can't replace that with a machine or a program. The real communication > between artist and audience is about what it's like to be human at any > particular time. I use computers and software as tools and also as part of > the structural and communication systems existent today. I convey my own > emotions, feelings and perceptions about being human using those tools. > It's no different that using a really good microphone to amplify and > enhance a human voice. So the short answer is Yes non-human entities can > perform but no they can't make art. > > > > G.H. Hovagimyan > http://nujus.net/~gh > http://nujus.net/~nublog > http://artistsmeeting.org > -- // Victoria Bradbury <PROJECTS> www.victoriabradbury.com Researcher @ www.crumbweb.org New Media Caucus <http://www.newmediacaucus.org> <CommComm> Attaya Projects <http://attayaprojects.com> // Collaborator