Page 34 - Studio International - June 1970
P. 34
saw this series I for a moment did not detect
that the image depicts a male and a female
head on the left, and still more ambiguous are
the two standing figures on the right. Cordeiro
and Moscati seem to be interested, like Richard
Hamilton, in what Richard Morphet describes
as 'the knife-edge border between legibility
and illegibility'.1 The possibilities of effecting
this kind of modulation in films seem very
hopeful. Cordeiro's and Moscati's series seems
like so many stills from a film sequence,
exploring, perhaps, an elusive human relation-
ship without the need for actors.
Computer-animated films are also an interest-
ing and fairly virgin field, and moreover a
sound economic proposition since they genu-
inely mechanize a tedious and expensive
manual job. The same cannot be said of the
computer program ART! devised by Pro-
fessors Katherine Nash and Richard H.
Williams, of the universities of Minnesota and
New Mexico respectively.2 The logic of this
seems to be that the computer industry is
emphasizing more and more the importance
of programme 'packages' for various profes-
sionals, so that doctors, accountants, draughts-
men and others can use the computer effective-
ly without having to bother themselves with
software or hardware 'internals'. The artist is
conceived as someone who wants to make a
`personal statement' in the form of various
squiggles, spheroids, etc., which he could
draw for himself with a ruler and pencil in
two minutes. For some reason Professors
Nash and Williams think it helpful to provide
this person with a set of programming facili-
ties so that he can make these squiggles, etc.,
at much greater expense and more laboriously.
The justification claimed is that the artist
does not have to find out about computers
before using the programme. The fallacy is
that of regarding the artist as a specialist with
pre-defined professional needs. The pro-
gramme ART! would be acceptable if it were
presented more modestly as a teaching-aid
for use in education at an elementary level.
JONATHAN BENTHALL
0
1 Richard Hamilton, Tate Gallery catalogue, 1970
1,2, 3 and 4 could be used in computer graphics, and 2 Page 7, Bulletin of Computer Arts Society, March
Waldemar Cordeiro—Giorgio Moscati, Sao Paulo 1970
Derivadas de Uma Imagem 1969 reminds us that traditional graphics include
The image, originally from a Valetine's Day poster, `etching, engraving, and other abrasive/ An exhibition held in May at the Camden Art
was digitized at 7 levels of darkness. Each printout
is a transformation of the preceding one. The incisive techniques'. Centre contained some examples of the
computer programme scans the image for horizontal The exhibition mounted by the Computer logical, systematized approach to art that the
and vertical breaks.
Arts Society to accompany the symposium exhibition's name, 'Manufactured Art', im-
was disappointing, though some stylish plied: notably Rory McEwen's neat irridescent
graphics by Auro Lecci, an associate of the multiples priced at under £2. Other contribu-
computer musician Pietro Grossi, are worth tions, such as work-in-progress on water and
noting. To illustrate this article I have chosen light by Marcello Salvadori's environmental
a series of four graphics (not in the CAS research students, seemed far from any
exhibition) by Waldemar Cordeiro and intelligible definition of manufactured art. It
Giorgio Moscati from Brasil. They have used has been shown already that exhibitions of
an IBM 360/44 to perform transformations on `high-technology' art can be usefully energiz-
a digitized image, using a standard line ing-as no doubt this has been-even when
printer as the output device. What makes me weak in overall concept. I must nonetheless
feel that this is art rather than contrivance is point out that the time is now ripe for exhibi-
the evocative choice of image. When I first tions that present a more coherent theme.
