a note about the lecture style

• interrupt me anytime if you don't understand, and especially do so because most pieces of information will have consequence for what follows
• hold discussion questions for the end

thanks to Stas and you all for this opportunity!

1. Nov. 6: a pragmatic aesthetic theory
2. Nov. 13: layers of algorithmic processes and interaction
3. Nov. 20: openness

today's schedule:

1. 16:20 - 17:40: discussion of a pragmatic aesthetic theory
2. 17:40 - 18:00
3. 18:00 - 19:10: thoughts about programming, understanding your projects and goals

1981: type-in programs in basic, TI-994A

• type-in programs (in mags like Compute, Byte): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Type-in_program
• TI-994A: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Instruments_TI-99/4A

1987-1988: Kitaro, Vangelis, Wendy Carlos, and my Yamaha PortaSound PSS-470

• Kitaro, Silk Road: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ONjMiLMw66g
• Vangelis, Spiral: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aVpvFMgPQRI
  • this, along with my dad's book collection, simultaneously introduced me to the Tao Te Ching!
  • “Going on means going far - Going far means returning” chapter 25
  • Stephen Mitchell, Tao Te Ching translation, 1988: https://terebess.hu/english/tao/mitchell.html
• Wendy Carlos, Beauty in the Beast (scales!) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beauty_in_the_Beast
• Yamaha PortaSound PSS-470: https://www.vintagesynth.com/yamaha/pss470.php
• Music from the Hearts of Space https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hearts_of_Space

1990: Pascal on a Mac: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal_(programming_language)

1994: Max for MIDI, TurboSynth, ARP 2600, Csound

1997: George Brecht's Water Yam https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_Yam_(artist%27s_book)

• Fluxus

1999: Adrian Ward's Autoillustrator https://artelectronicmedia.com/en/artwork/auto-illustrator/

2001: Autechre, Confield

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confield
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluxus

2005: SuperCollider

2006: Lisp, Scheme

• The Little Schemer: https://wiki.c2.com/?TheLittleSchemer

2007: Conductive (Haskell), live coding

2015: completed doctoral degree “Affect-Based Aesthetic Evaluation and Development of Abstractions for Rhythm in Live Coding”

2021: Conductive port to JavaScript

1. a pragmatic aesthetic theory
2. application to algorithmic art
3. the algorithm as an affector

John Dewey, Art as Experience: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/dewey-aesthetics/

2013. “Towards Useful Aesthetic Evaluations of Live Coding.” In Proceedings of the International Computer Music Conference. Perth, Australia. http://renickbell.net/pdf/renick-bell-icmc-2013.pdf

2013. “Pragmatic Aesthetic Evaluation of Abstractions for Live Coding.” In Proceedings of Meeting No. 17 of the Japanese Society for Sonic Arts. Nagoya, Japan: The Japanese Society for Sonic Arts. http://www.jssa.info/doku.php?id=journal017

2013. “Considering Interaction in Live Coding through a Pragmatic Aesthetic Theory.” In Proceedings of SI13, NTU/ADM Symposium on Sound and Interactivity. Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. http://soundislands.com/si13/proceedings/papers/04-Considering%20Interaction%20in%20Live%20Coding%20through%20a%20Pragmatic%20Aesthetic%20Theory.pdf

2013. “Pragmatically Judging Generators.” In Proceedings of the Generative Art 2013 Conference. Milan, Italy. http://www.generativeart.com/ga2013xWEB/proceedings1/17.pdf

2014. “Considering Interaction in Live Coding through a Pragmatic Aesthetic Theory.” eContact! 16 (2). http://cec.sonus.ca/econtact/16_2/bell_livecoding.html (This paper is a revised version of the paper with the same title published in 2013.)