networks and my art

Networks play an enormous role in my work and methodology. Simply put, my work would not exist in the way it does without the internet and other networks. I get my inspiration from television shows I watched as a child, other artists I find on social networks and YouTube. I have strong roots in graphic design as well, and without the internet my work would either be incredibly simple or non-existent because I’d have no idea what to do. The distribution and presentation of art is also incredibly important, what is art without someone to look at it? Networks allow art to be shown to the masses easily and make it more accessible to the general public-not only to view, but also to learn how to create it. Networks play a particularly significant role in creative computing, allowing us to share and distribute code and to teach the basics to people who may not have access to higher education in computing. The Internet has helped my own work flourish and has allowed me to become more confident in creating art (particularly making ‘bad’ art) and improving.  

bots and me

With AIs like chat GPT and websites like character.ai, bots are becoming more prominent in the public eye. However, AI has been around for much longer than just recently, though they have perhaps gone under the radar. When people talk to Alexa, Siri or their Google Homes, they’re not generally conscious they’re talking to a bot. It registers more as a glorified search engine. In my personal life I use a lot of bots: like in my discord servers that let me listen to music with my friends or when I unfortunately get spam emails and messages those are also bots contacting me. I get calendar and appointment reminders from bots and if I have an issue on a website there is usually a query bot I have to speak to, to get help, like on Amazon, for example.

It’s hard to imagine how else bots could be introduced into our lives, but it’s only a matter of time before they consume every part of the modern experience. I think generally bots can be helpful in making the internet a more accessible place to people with disabilities, such as blindness, and I hope in the future this improves to become more helpful and more accessible to a wider range of disabilities.

cat memes and what they say about human behaviour

I created a zip folder dataset based off of cat memes throughout the years. Cyclical behaviour in humans (particularly online) has always interested me because I’ve often noticed patterns in the way we communicate and the media we consume. I chose cat memes because they are such a staple in internet culture, and once I looked into it I found that cat ‘memes’ are in fact much older than I first thought- stemming all the way back to the early 1800s. My main source was ‘The History & Origin of Cat Memes: From the 18th Century to lolcats; Or, How Cats have Basically Changed the Internet and the World Furever’ by Claire Sewell and Spencer D. C. Keralis, their work was invaluable to this dataset. It’s particularly interesting to me that modern internet communities are so quick to move on from trends when in reality the newest trends are rebrands of the same jokes and decisions we made 10 or even 100 years ago.

Hypothetically, my dataset could be maintained as long as the internet exists, and grow to expand over the decades. Ideally, some sort of AI would be able to maintain it considering it’s such an expansive topic, even I couldn’t include as many pictures as I would’ve liked. If I wanted to present it to the public I might post it on some sort of public blog and maybe open it up to submissions! So that the community would be able to participate in archiving what they believe to be the most significant parts of internet history.

NOTE: The zip files had to be uploaded to OneDrive instead of here because of the limits of this website. Please view below.

catmemes.zip

sharing and data in online spaces

Much of Memo Akten’s work revolves around ‘copy’ and specifically the reappropriation of electronics and software to create his art, like his series of ‘co-created’ AI generated images.  

Notes on Ley Manovich’s ‘Data’ text:

-Creating this representation involves three steps: understanding its boundaries, what objects you will represent and what characteristics of said objects you will include (this does not have to be done linearly). 

-A phenomenon (what we are collecting data on) is constituted by its representations and the conversations about it.  

-If we find correlations or patterns that describe only part of the data, this does not mean that our method is weak. 

-data= objects + features 

-Before we can use a computer to analyse a phenomenon, behaviour, or activity, they have to be represented as a finite set of individual data objects that have a finite number of features. 

 -Data representation is modular, and the features are encoded in such a way that we can calculate on them. + Only one format can be used for each feature.  

 -The most common format to organize data is a table and is used in every professional field. It is the way data society understands phenomena and individuals, and acts on them.  

 -Datasets are not just random collections of information- but objects structured in ways that allow them to exist within a computational medium. 

adventure code revisited

For this task I swapped code from the last post with a fellow student. I adjusted their code to appear more ‘code-like’ with functions and if statements etc. Another student made my code a little more game-like in that they added experience points and rewards for the hero. Below is the adjusted version of the code.

The Hero's Journey
//The most common template in narrative stories, if you want to become a hero in the most basic sense, run this code.

function call to adventure(){
hero(call to adventure);
//hero has a reason to adventure, usually something they care about in danger

if (refusal to call){
hero(does it anyway)
}

//hero may encounter mentor to encourage and train them to adventure despite
wishes

function trials and tribulations(){
hero(faces danger)
hero(struggles but improves)
hero(Gains experience points)
hero(Gains first weapon)
}

function death and rebirth(){
hero(faces ultimate obstacle)
hero(fails?)
hero(loses experience points)
option(start over)
hero(succeeds eventually)
reward(in hero's hands)
hero (Gains experience points)
hero(Gains a new weapon)
}
//aforementioned mentor may die and result in hero becoming more powerful.

function returnal and resurrection(){
hero(returns with reward and newfound knowledge)
hero(gains experience points and new weapons)
ending(happy)
option(replay game or end it)
}
//ending may be bittersweet

run code for adventure

Below is a pseudocode based on the ‘hero’s journey’ narrative, which is a common template in most stories. I think it’s an interesting and abstract interpretation of such a trope and works as a cool contrast and fusion between the logic and rigidity of code and the artistic abstract form of storytelling.

The Hero's Journey
//The most common template in narrative stories, if you want to become a hero in the most basic sense, run this code.

function call to adventure(){
hero(call to adventure);
//hero has a reason to adventure, usually something they care about in danger

if (refusal to call){
hero(does it anyway)
}

//hero may encounter mentor to encourage and train them to adventure despite
wishes

function trials and tribulations(){
hero(faces danger)
hero(struggles but improves)
}

function death and rebirth(){
hero(faces ultimate obstacle)
hero(fails?)
hero(succeeds eventually)
reward(in hero's hands)
}
//aforementioned mentor may die and result in hero becoming more powerful.

function returnal and resurrection(){
hero(returns with reward and newfound knowledge)
ending(happy)
}
//ending may be bittersweet

what is a computer???

In technical terms a computer is a programmable device that manipulates, stores and displays information and data. But really, you know what a computer is, you’re using one right now! Yes, right now to read this- amazing. To me, a computer is home to The Internet, because frankly there’s only so much minesweeper and chrome dino you can play before it gets boring. A computer is the near past and the very distant future, and depending who you ask, is the best or worst thing to happen to humanity. Art has been made using computers pretty much since its invention, and the relationship between the two has only (and will only) become more intertwined in the future, as shown in Whitechapel Gallery’s ‘Electronic Superhighway’ exhibition that displays over 100 pieces of work from the 1960s to now. The exhibition acts as an archive of the development of computer art, and it’s fascinating to think that people in the future will look at tech-based art from present day the same way we view it now from the 60s. That thought being “Wow, they sure had no idea what was coming.”