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Fabrica, the Benetton communication research center, leads an important international workshop and lecture program. Bruce Sterling, writer and futurologist, was invited by the institute from November 25th to 28th 2008 to lead an intensive trans-disciplinary workshop. For each workshop, a guest lecturer is invited to write a final critical essay. This time, the Sterling’s workshop results inspired a critical essay by Marco Mancuso
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ES
IGN
ING
PR
OC
ES
SE
S
RAT
HE
R T
HA
N A
RT
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A Fabrica Workshops project
directed by Bruce Sterling
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Edited by Omar Vulpinari
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04 05
A zealot with rigid, abstract, unswerving
principles will fi nd that life becomes surreal.
Generative art is quite like this. Generative
art is a twenty-fi rst century effort using
networked tools to make images and
objects that the twentieth century could
not imagine.
Generative artists are sociable. They are
eager to share their code, to swap tips
about hardware, and to validate each
other’s other worldly efforts. Their beloved
computer language, Processing, crafted
specifi cally by and for computer artists, is
open-source software — with all the dense,
web-based sociality that breed of
software implies.
Furthermore, Web 2.0-style participatory
sites such as FlickR and Vimeo
have become the global galleries for
generative art.
Yet the machinery is not central to
the effort. The core of generative art
is the artistic ability to see and shape
‘processuality’ — the code of form.
Processuality is a modern change in
artistic perception, inspired by the
craft of software. Our world is rich with
processuality — the growth of plants,
boiling liquid, the cracks in mud —
processuality is all around us. A rather
similar ruckus struck the visual arts in
the early 1900s, when the machineries of
cinema revealed hidden realities of motion,
time, and space.
This Fabrica workshop carried
‘computational aesthetics’ outside the
computer. We methodically experimented
with processuality, crafting tightly-written
instructions to generate images, objects,
and situations in the real world. By taking
that step into ‘dynamic abstraction,’ by
forfeiting some human control, artists
and designers can coax radically strange
results from even the meagerest resources.
The teams were given tiny graphic scraps
the size of postage stamps. The rest was
left to their rigor, imagination, discipline,
and insight.
I’m proud to say that everything you see
in this booklet was generated — through
processes they built themselves.
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by Bruce Sterling
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Designing Processes Rather Than Art / by Bruce Sterling
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06 07
Ernst Heinrich Haeckel’s Artforms in
Nature (Kunstformen der Natur, 1904) is a
legendary favorite of generative artists.
Why? Because the ‘art’ forms here have
no human origin. They were all generated
by processes — in this case, by biological
activities. By picking them out, curating
them, and arranging them on the page,
Haeckel framed them as ‘art.’
Also, Haeckel’s work has long been in the
public domain, so it’s free for use for any
purpose. Generative artwork, for instance.
We’ll design a simple ‘process’ for creating
graphic elements from Haeckel.
BEGIN
1. Go to FlickR. Find the comprehensive
scan of the entire work of Haeckel put up
there by some freeware sympathizer. The
online community certainly is supportive.
Wow.
2. Pick out one image.
Bryozoans should do (image left).
3. Print out the image on paper (image A).
4. Get some scissors.
5. Cut the page in half (image B).
6. Cut the halves in half (image C).
7. Cut the halves in half (image D).
8. Cut the halves in half (image E).
10. Cut the halves in half (image F).
This seems mechanically repetitious,
but ‘processes’ never get tired. 2, 4, 8,
16, 32 — nothing comes more easily
to a generative process.
11. Now we’ve got a scattered galaxy of
graphic elements that no human being
could have planned or foreseen.
Using human judgment, pick out three
processed elements as the ‘art’ (elements
1, 2 and 3).
END
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08
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Your assignment is to DESIGN A PROCESS that
uses these three elements to create
a COMPLETE AND FINISHED WORK that you will
show at the end of the workshop.
You might do wallpaper, an animation, a
music video, fabric, or a poster. These are
all typical applications for generative art.
You might even print out the elements,
put them on cardboard, and use them as
3D elements to generate architecture or
furniture. These are rarer, but generative
art is getting into generative building and
generative manufacturing.
You can take these elements and copy
them, multiply them, repeat them, invert
them, rotate them, mirror them, change
their scales, assemble them in fl ocks and
patterns, overlap them, even colorize them
or cut them in fragments.
But: these elements are all the graphics
you have. Don’t add anything else.
Generative art has two unique challenges.
First, it never directly designs any artwork.
It ‘generates‘ art through process. You are
designing a process. Your process has
to be explicit and rigorous. It’s a set
of instructions.
Below are your three graphic elements for
the Generative Art workshop.
Your process has to begin with the word
BEGIN and end with the word END.
This process has to be so clearly phrased,
so simple and so accurate that ANYONE
can execute it anywhere and get the same
results (or very similar results). You’ll fi nd
that this is quite hard to do. Pressing the
button and running the process is easy.
Backing off to think deeply about process
in a clear and intelligible way is the hard
craft-work of generative art. That’s where
the action is.
Furthermore, you’re not going to execute
this process yourself (even though you
can practice doing it so as to refi ne your
process). You’re going to be handing your
process to SOMEONE ELSE to ‘execute.‘
If they can’t understand what you mean
and follow the instructions correctly,
you’ve failed!
The second unique problem is the Sorcerer’s
Apprentice problem, or, getting the process
to stop in some complete and fi nished
position. Since processes aren’t human and
have no aesthetic judgment, they tend to
grind on endlessly. As a generative artist,
it’s up to you to choose where to stop your
process and how to frame the results as
You have these three elements, you have no
more, and no less. You are required to use all
three of these elements and you can’t use
anything else. These are your constraints.
A
1 2 3
B C
D E F
09
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10
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your completed work of art.
This is also hard to do; but if you fail to
design a process that produces a coherent
artwork, you haven’t made any art; at best,
you’ve made a tool. Almost anything can be
a generative tool — a ruler, scissors,
a repeating drip of paint.
Making tools is not the point here. When the
workshop is over you must have something
complete and coherent to show.
In conclusion, a few general words of
advice that seem to have helped other
people struggling to create good generative
processes.
Start simple. Let the complexity grow from
the process itself. Repeat it till you get a
good intuitive feel for it. Get comfortable
with its processuality.
Be fast, clear, small, elegant and bug-free;
avoid unnecessary stunts that will create
random confusion.
The rules come out of the parts, while the
parts come out of the rules. The details
refl ect the logic of the whole creation.
If it’s too tightly controlled, it will look boring
and mechanical; if it’s too loose, it will look
sloppy and chaotic. Try to fi nd a sweet spot
where the process seems to ‘live.’
Good generative art is for human beings;
it combines regularities with surprises
in a humanly pleasing way.
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12
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FLOWER, ZOOM, PUZZLE
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Processor: Lawrence Blankenbyl
Executor: Fernando Acquarone
Secretary: Hanna Abi-Hanna
Critic: An Namyoung
Art director: Diego Beyró
Assistant: Geremia Vinattieri
13
PROJECT 1
Haeckel’s work reminded us of micro
organisms like bacteria. Our initial idea was
to write a process that could mimic the
growth and decay of bacteria or disease.
We looked at some video art that used
generative techniques and decided
to create a video with several layers
or processes. A layer of patterns and
graphics created by a generative process,
and a second layer using stop motion
photography. Each step of the earlier
process is printed and then photographed
with a person holding up the frame to
camera. This created two processes, one
inside the other.
All the processes that we generated are
infi nite. Each of them could potentially go
on forever, so creating a work of art using
these infi nite building blocks was entirely
dependent on the ‘stopping’ and the
‘framing’ of these processes.
The fi nal output we chose is in the form of
three videos (one of each process) playing
simultaneously on one screen.
Initial research phase.
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14 15
GRAPHIC PROCESS:
FLOWER
BEGIN
1. Make twenty identical copies
of element 1.
2. Paste one copy of element 1 vertically
centred on a portrait A3 page.
3. Capture an image of this page.
4. Align and place a copy of element 1 over
the last placed element.
5. Rotate the top most element six degrees
counter clockwise and paste.
6. Capture an image of this page.
7. Repeat steps 4 through 6, eighteen times.
8. Scale the last placed element 120%.
9. Make twenty identical copies of this
element.
10. Paste one copy of the newly scaled
element centred and aligned with the top
most element on the page.
11. Capture an image of this page.
12. Repeat x times steps 4 through 11.
END
ZOOM
BEGIN
1. Scale element 2 to A3 format.
2. Capture an image of this.
3. Scale the image 125%.
4. Crop centred to A3 format.
5. Capture an image of this.
6. Repeat twenty-three times steps 3
through 5.
END
PUZZLE
BEGIN
1. Make nine identical copies of element 3.
2. Create a 3x3 grid using the nine elements
in a landscape format centred on an A4
sheet of paper. All sides should meet but
not overlap.
3. Remove middle element so only eight
elements remain.
4. Capture an image of this page.
5. Using only vertical and horizontal
movement, move one element into the
empty slot.
6. Capture an image of this.
7. Repeat twenty-three times steps 5 and 6.
END
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Flower graphic process.
Zoom graphic process.
Puzzle graphic process.
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VIDEO PROCESS:
FLOWER
BEGIN
1. Stack prints of all the images captured
from graphic process FLOWER in the same
order they were captured; the fi rst captured
image on top, the last on the bottom.
2. Stand three feet away from a still camera.
3. Hold the stack of images up to the camera
and take a picture.
4. Remove the top most image from the stack.
5. Repeat steps 2 and 3 for all prints.
END
ZOOM
BEGIN
1. Stack prints of all the images captured
from graphic process ZOOM in the same order
they were captured; the fi rst captured image
on top, the last on the bottom.
2. Stand three feet away from a still camera.
3. Hold the stack of images up to the camera
and take a picture.
4. Take half a step back. Each step measures
the length of your foot.
5. Repeat steps 3 and 4 for all prints.
END
PUZZLE
BEGIN
1. Stack prints of all the images captured
from graphic process PUZZLE in the same
order they were captured; the fi rst captured
image on top, the last on the bottom.
2. Stand three feet away from a still camera.
3. Hold the stack of images up to the camera
and take a picture.
4. Remove the top most image from the stack.
5. Repeat steps 2 and 3 for all prints.
END
16 17
Final three videos playing simultaneously on one screen.
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18
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DIS-PLAY
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Processor: Lizy Cretney
Executor: Lorenzo Fanton
Secretary: Tak Cheung
Critic: Simone Cannolicchio
Art director: Pau Casals
After seeing all the possible outcomes and
challenges, we were very attracted with the
element of live performance and human
physical interactions. This led us to develop
a concept for a generative game.
We adopted an arcade game format to
create an interactive play. The goals and
challenges of this game are governed
by the generative output from the given
graphic elements. Similar to a shuffl e of a
deck of cards where the randomness would
result in different play every time. The game
is scripted to produce a winner that will end
the generative process.
The resulting work is a fi nished piece
of generative art. It has a structure with
a beginning and an end. The process
instructions have elements of deviation to
produce a random outcome. This game has
inherent play value, human emotional value
(love for the game) and a resulting visual
graphic value. After each game the path of
every player manipulates the graphics on
the playing board. Every artwork created by
each DIS-PLAY game is a recorded history
of the players’ choices, of strategic body
movements, results of the game and
of the fun.
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20 21
PROCESS:
The player who fi rst picks up all his/her
coloured markers wins the game and ends
the process.
Two to four players may participate.
BEGIN
(Making the game board)
1. Take element 1 provided and crop
it to form a square.
2. Divide the image into an 8 x 8 grid.
3. Print each square of the grid to fi t
a sheet of A3 paper.
4. Trim the white edges to form
the square unit.
5. Place the 8 x 8 grid onto the ground.
This is your game board.
(Making the markers)
6. Take three sheets of different coloured A4
paper for each player.
7. Cut each sheet to form a circle with 20 cm
of diameter. These are the markers.
(Preparing the game)
8. Each player chooses a different starting
corner. The starting player is chosen by any
conventional game selection method (dice,
scissors/paper/rock, etc).
9. Players take turns (clockwise) in placing
markers on squares of the grid. One by one.
The intention is to place them as far apart
as possible because these will become the
goal markers for the player to their right.
(Playing the game)
10. The players take turns moving to
different squares (adjacent not diagonal).
The square he/she leaves behind turns
upside down. If the player moves onto a
square containing his/her coloured marker
he/she may collect it. Moving onto a square
containing another player’s marker
is not permitted.
This continues until a player collects
all of his/her markers.
END
Construction of the grid.
Game in progress.
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22 23
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LOOPY CANOPY
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Processor: Patrick Waterhouse
Executor: Gabo Gesualdi
Secretary: Jade Folawiyd
Critic: Mariana Eggers
Art director: Clara Failla
The loopy curtain holds elements of order
and disorder. Order is obtained by the
loop strings that can be made of a limited
number of thirty. A random process
is elaborated on each element as the dice
is used to control what strand you connect
to the next, to develop the weaving.
The intriguing aspect of this canopy is
that its behavioral prediction is almost
impossible. Therefore the results of the
loopy canopy remain within set limits, whilst
also being subject to startling variables.
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24 25
PROCESS :
BEGIN
(Phase 1)
1. Go to the photocopier with three images
(elements 1, 2 and 3).
2. Blow up every image to 400%.
3. Cut the white borders of each.
4. Repeat steps 1, 2 and 3 twice.
5. Arrange the images randomly in the
photocopier and photocopy. This is your
new base image.
6. Make forty copies of it.
7. Put the copies with face up inside
the printer again.
8. Print forty copies. Now both sides
are printed.
9. Stack all the copies together.
10. Place them landscape in the guillotine.
11. Cut stack into strings with width of 2 cm.
You will have lots of strings.
12. Pick up a string and loop it. Join the
edges together with a stapler. You have a
ring now.
13. Repeat twenty-nine times step 12. You
have thirty rings now.
14. Pick up a string and loop it through the
center of two rings and join string with
stapler. This is the process to make a chain
of three rings.
15. Use process explained in step 14 to
make thirty chains of three rings, thirty of
four, thirty of fi ve, and thirty of six.
(Phase 2)
16. Pick up one of the prints from step 8.
17. Use this print to make a cube following
a method of your preference
or see this video: http://it.youtube.com/
watch?v=gvC7dDewBNc
18. Put numbers from 1 to 6 on each side
of cube, now it’s a dice.
(Phase 3)
19. Roll the dice.
20. Take one of the chains with the amount
of rings corresponding to number from
dice roll.
21. Place it on the fl oor in vertical position.
22. Repeat ten times step 19, 20 and 21,
placing the chains side by side.
(Phase 4)
23. Join fi rst and second chains, by their
bottom ring, with one string.
24. Repeat step 23 between second and
third chain, then between third and fourth,
then between fourth and fi fth, and so on till
tenth chain.
END
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The process.
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26 27
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WORM
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Processor: Joao Wilbert
Executor: Elena Gianni
Secretary: Christopher Knowles
Critic: Julian Koschwitz
Art director: Joshua Levi
This project is an investigation into generative
systems of growth that have self-imposed
beginnings and ends; events akin to natural
occurrences defi ned by their platform
constraints.
The Worm Project is actually a list of
instructions and the result of following them
is a sculptural output. Users of the system
generate and print 3D cube templates, the size
of which are defi ned by the maximum printing
area of one’s personal printer. One continues
to print these cubes progressively smaller
until the cubes became physically impossible
to assemble. The larger the user’s printer, the
larger the initial cube, and therefore the more
cubes are produced in a single execution. This
provides a variable beginning with the naturally
occurring end.
In the next phase, users arrange the
assembled cubes following specifi c if-then-
else rules. The only undefi ned variable of this
phase is the environment, and the shape of the
environment the user selects radically changes
the aesthetics of the process’ sculptural
outcome. This is similar to nature; a process
of a growth where the building blocks of an
organism interact with the environment to
produce shape. Watching this process unfold
inspired the worm as a metaphorical guide.
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28 29
PROCESS:
BEGIN
(Creating box templates and prints)
1. Scan elements 1, 2, 3.
2. In image editing software, divide
elements 1, 2, 3 in half vertically.
3. Select the left half side of 1, 2, 3 and measure
its width.
5. Use this value as the height
for elements 1, 2, 3, so that all four sides
are of equal length creating a square.
6. You should now have three squares. Duplicate
each square. This will provide you with six.
7. Arrange squares in this order vertically:
element 1, 2, 1, 2. Place the remaining two
squares lining horizontally on both sides of the
second element 1 you laid vertically. This will
create a cross shaped image which will serve
as an unfolded box.
8. Add one quarter of the square height made
of white paper on the top and bottom and left
and right most squares of the cross. This will
provide fl aps to put glue on for folding
boxes later.
9. Adjust this image to fi ll the largest printable
area of your paper.
10. Copy this image on a different sheet
of paper, 95% the size of the previous image.
11. Repeat step 10 x times until cross shaped
image is no longer visible.
12. Print the cross shaped images.
Print result: Many prints, each with an image
95% the size of the previous prints.
(Folding boxes)
13. With scissors, cut the cross image
out of the white paper.
14. Fold along the boarders of each square
until you have six individual sides.
15. Apply glue to the white paper fl aps indicated
in step 8 and fold the cross into a cube.
16. Continue folding cubes until they become
physically too small for your hands to fold.
Result: You will end up with a series cubes,
each 95% the size of the previous.
(Building the Worm)
17. Choose an environment/surface.
18. Start with the largest box: set it down
on the chosen surface.
19. Set down the box 95% the size of the
previous box. Place this face to face with
fi rst box matching same image (elements 1, 2
and 3).
20. If you reach the end of your plane or
a physical barrier begin stacking RIGHT. If you
cannot stack RIGHT, stack LEFT. If you cannot
stack LEFT, stack upwards. If any number
of boxes fall while stacking, use the last box
stacked as the starting point to continue from
step 19, no matter where it has landed.
21. Continue this process until you run
out of boxes.
Result: Worm built
END
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The process.
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30 25
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CRUMPLED
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Processor: Gustavo Millón
Executor: Victor Hugo Cabañas,
Luis Nascimento
Secretary: Francesco Novara
Critic: Sanjin Petrovi
Art director: Vendi Budi
While brainstorming we started folding
rejected ideas into paper balls. Throwing
crumpled balls we stumbled on our actual
idea. We discovered that all the balls
together somehow created interesting
patterns. Thinking more deeply on this
idea we realized that there was an inner
generative peculiarity in it: no one could
repeat the process and come out with an
identical result. We then photocopied some
of the paper balls together and the pattern
that came out was interesting. The process
was reproducible and anybody could do it.
The entire process work led us to a symbolic
meaning: our work referred to a place where
anybody could put their new ideas, good
or bad. So decided to use it as a pattern
for a notebook cover.
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32 33
PROCESS:
BEGIN
1. Pick element 1 and enlarge image on
photocopier until you reach A3 format.
2. Repeat step 1 for elements 2 and 3.
3. Make four more copies of each
enlarged element.
4. Take one of the fi fteen enlarged copies
and crumple it into a ball of paper with
the print side on the outside.
5. Repeat step 4 with all other
enlarged copies.
6. Put the balls on the screen
of the photocopier.
7. Arrange them as you like.
8. Press copy button.
9. Repeat step 7 and 8 until you are satisfi ed
with the result.
10. Now you have a generative pattern that
you can use for a unique cover of your own
notebook for new ideas.
END
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The process.
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34 35
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2D SPACE-FILLER
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Processor: Lars Wannop
Executor: Martina Stancati
Secretary: Nora Varas
Critic: Vincent Van Uffelen
Art director: Jacqueline Steck
The concept of our project was born with the
idea of applying the end result on a 2D area.
It was decided to use an equilateral triangle
of three different sizes using the three
different pictures that were given, in order
to generate patterns or even textures.
With the process that we have created,
unique patterns can be generated. Moreover,
these patterns can be used to customize
any sort of object and area like carpets,
wallpapers, curtains, baseball-fi elds,
parking lots.
Developing our project, we managed
to make an accurate process that is possible
to use with any sort of image. This would
still generate millions of different patterns
that later could be applied and customize
whatever you want.
Our 2D SPACE-FILLER is a design project that
works within the framework of textile design.
It is a generator of designs that engages with
the shape of any space making it a pleasing
area where to live and work.
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36 37
PROCESS:
CONSTRAINT
The given process can only be applied
on spaces having borders with minimum
distance from each other larger than two
times the largest triangle’s side length.
NOTES
Each tile must touch one side with another
already placed tile. Make sure that the edges
of the two tiles are aligned.
This process makes use of tiles of three
different sizes. A smaller tile is available
if the last used tile has been either the
biggest or medium sized one.
Space should be a 2D plane of fabric,
wall, fl oor, etc., that you intend to cover
with the tiles.
BEGIN
(Creating tiles)
1. Open images provided (element 1, 2 and 3)
in a digital image processing software
of your choice.
2. Triangle A: create an equilateral triangle
(keep a minimum side length of 25 cm) and fi ll
it completely with a crop of element 1.
3. Triangle B: create an equilateral triangle
scaled to 50% of the triangle A and fi ll it
completely with a crop of source element 2.
4. Triangle C: create an equilateral triangle
scaled to 50% of triangle B and fi ll it
completely with a crop of element 3.
5. Print multiple triangles of each size.
6. Cut triangles from print sheets and discard
the excess white paper.
7. Steps 5 and 6 might have to be repeated
depending on the size of the space.
(Executing the process)
8. Move to random position of the space.
9. Start with one of available triangle A’s
and place it printed side up on the fl oor.
10. Place tile, identical to fi rst, side up,
adjacent to previous tile.
11. Repeat step 10 until space has been
completely covered by triangles of that size.
12. Place next smaller tile available
and continue as per Step 10.
13. Continue this process, always fi lling
the space, before moving to the next
smallest tile.
END
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The process.
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Bruce Sterling interviewed by Andy Cameron
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38
Why Generative art?
I got interested in generative art in
2007 when I saw that people were doing
generative work with computer fabricators.
I’ve been very interested in fabricators for
a long time; any kind of method of moving
digital plans into physical actuality makes
little bells go off for me.
Then I saw these guys were using
fabricators with generative processes
instead of simply executing plans. They
were writing this kind of mobile code that
causes these fabricators to output things
that were not pre-planned. I immediately
thought, “ok this is like some kind of
the equivalent of an acoustic guitar
undergoing electric feedback.” They are
actually getting shapes and volumes
and forms out of this approach that are
humanly impossible.
How do you know if it’s any good or not?
You turn this stuff out but isn’t most of
it junk?
Yes, but in my line of work, science fi ction,
author Theodore Sturgeon coined the law
that says, “90 percent of everything, is
junk or crap.” In any case generative art
since it’s so easy to generate it’s more like
99.9999 percent of it is junk.
How do you deal with this absence of
intentionality considering that normally
with artistic works, we have this idea
that it’s the person who is expressing
something to his or her audience? Humans
who are expressing their meaning, their
feeling, their position and their point of
view, all of that goes out of the window
with generative art. So, in a sense, it
becomes something that is no longer part
of inter-human discourse, but it becomes
almost like a natural fact.
I think it does go out of the window but
it kind of creeps back into the basement,
the attic.
What do you mean?
Well you know, writing is an expression of
thought but software is an expression of
will. So if you look at the software that you
use to generate all these forms, images,
whatever, I mean the software has a kind
of clarity and intentionality that’s very,
very intentional even more intentional than
some kind of direct declaration by
an author, because in fact that’s a series
of deliberate commands, “do this, do that,
if this then do that” so it’s a kind of a huge
reservoir of sort of raw intentionality in
the code and then somebody has to frame
the output and they also have to sort of
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40
winnow through in this enormous potential
of generated forms, so there you’ve got
a kind of curatorial will coming out.
So that’s where the value comes back into
it? A kind of process of selection?
I think that generative processes do very,
very strange things to value. Normally
we think of objects having some kind of
inherent value but most generative stuff
that I’ve seen to date, and I think that
the purest expression of generative stuff
has to use extremely cheap materials,
kind of really humble materials: card
boards, Styrofoam, plaster, mock up
style stuff, and then invest a great deal
of processuality into it. Actually if you’re
doing generative art and you’re doing it
with something that is inherently precious
it tends to defl ate the impact of the work
and detracts from the purity of your ability
to just see the process itself.
One of the values that you’re identifying
is being able to perceive in the form of the
things the processes that have led to the
making of that shape or that form.
I think that’s got to be the key to an
aesthetic there, the processuality is really
what you fi nd.
Therefore the material itself isn’t really
interesting.
If you’re doing movie criticism you talk
about things like the cinematic quality
of the image or particular cinematic
sequence. In criticising generative
art I think the process is what’s happening,
in sort of what this things brings
to the table.
What kind of things can help us to think
about this new way of designing, what
kind of things that came before? In your
lecture you talked about gardening...
Being a writer I’m hung up on metaphor
like a lot of writers are so I was collecting
metaphors that seem to me to apply
generative art and I’m also collecting
metaphors that generative artists have
used to describe their own work because
they really do have to struggle to establish
a new vocabulary that sort of validates
what they are doing, judge their own
intentions. So, it is rather like gardening
in some sense because you sort of have
seed, there is a program, and you have
like the earth which is like the machine
that’s producing it and you sort of have
to wait patiently as the process works its
way through. You have to weed the bugs
out of the process other wise the bugs
will eat the process, so forth and so on
and eventually you end up with a prize
pumpkin! But people will not call gardening
fi ne art and it’s possible that generative
design is not fi ne art. Maybe
it isn’t, maybe it is more like an optical
toy, like a kaleidoscope. When you go
out you can make a kaleidoscope: there
are bad kaleidoscopes where the glass
is kind of dirty, there are a really nice
kaleidoscopes bounded brass jewel like
colours, but they are all kaleidoscopes.
Fine art isn’t a thing outside of us, fi ne
art is whatever we decide is fi ne art. If you
are suggesting that generative art is a
meaningful putting together of two words
if that’s legal as it were, that surely means
that the concept of what fi ne art is has
to stretch rather than saying, “this lies
outside of it.”
Concepts of fi ne art have been subjected
to a great deal of stretching for over a
century and that’s not what I really fi nd
of interest. I am interested in art, I’m
interest in generative stuff but I’m also
interested in just trying to shape the
vocabulary and the approaches of a very
encoded little infant fi eld. I don’t think
we are going to fi nd a mature
understanding of what generative art
is really good for, for maybe another twenty
years or so. The fi rst experiments that you
can legitimately call generative art are
probably fi fty, forty-fi ve years old now, but
the hardware is different and the software
is different and there’s a sort of a more
productive capacity and new methods of
writing code and sharing artistic input.
What I’m really looking for
are some place markers and I don’t think
that kind of relativism in art criticism helps
in a situation like this, because generative
art is already all over the map it doesn’t
need more freedom. It really needs
kind of some harsh...
But the danger is that you end up with
those pieces I really dislike when
programmers are making things that
generate stuff that looks like oil paintings.
I just think that that’s so wrong because
they’re trying to make generative art
which emulates their vision of what fi ne
art should be, which is way outdated. In
the examples that you showed the other
evening for example I much prefer the
square ones to the ones where people try
to be painterly. What’s the point of trying
to be painterly?
I completely agree. I was showing examples
there some of which were being done by
guys in the 1960s who are actual artists
and discovering algorithms and then there
are paintings being done by basically
programmers or computer hobbyists that
suddenly fi nd these graphic outputs things
and sort of say “ Hey wow! I can twist the
contrast button up to eleven, let’s see
what comes out!” Okay, that’s not very
artistic. It’s just not. What it is, is tinker
toy-like or playful or hackerly.
I think you need a method by which you can
sort of say, “this is the golden road forward
and this is just junk.” It’s cheap to make
and there is lots of it, and you put it on
your Flickr set but no that’s not making you
into Michelangelo you know, I’m just sorry.
That’s what I’m trying to establish here.
What about the concept of breeding, do
you think that’s useful? The idea that if we
take the biological gardening metaphor
41
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and push it a little bit further you are
making a generation of things, you’re
selecting the ones you like, you then brief
on them and then select again, in that way
it’s generative but it’s guided by... in the
same way the evolution is a kind of...
On Flickr there is a set I watched with some
interest, which is called Generative and
evolutionary art, and I don’t think they are
the same thing. Evolutionary art can be
a generative technique, but it’s certainly
not the only generative technique. And
I think in a lot of cases these biological
metaphors although are very seductive to
generative artist that say, “I’m growing my
image, I’m nurturing it, I’m gardening it, It’s
biomorphic, It’s life like,” they actually fall
fl at because some of the most interesting
applications of generative art are not
biological looking at all. Information,
visualization, applications and so forth
they’re really means of making the invisible
visible and they don’t have to look like a
pretty tree or a lovely fl ower or a nice stuff.
No, I don’t mean that it ends up looking
like biology I’m talking about a formal
process which seems to me to be actually
not even a metaphor but almost a…
Well, there are a bunch of those. I mean
there is the Lindenmayer system, there is
the Karl Sims system of evolution.
If I generate a hundred images and
then select two, and then use those to
generate another hundred and then select
two, that’s not a metaphor for evolution.
But you can automate the selection
process, you don’t have to humanly
intervene in the breeding at all, you can
just sort of say, “Okay, whichever one
moved fastest to this fake environment
gets re-bred.”
But you can’t code for aesthetics, can you?
No.
I mean that’s where the human has to be.
It seems to me that I’m just coming back
to the beginning of this discussion. When
you abstract the human completely, you
are abstracting value.
You can’t code for aesthetics but I think
there is aesthetics of code.
But if there isn’t someone who’s making a
decision somewhere, about what’s good,
what’s to be presented as the good thing,
the work of art; then you really don’t have
value you just have process.
I guess, but we are sort of wandering into
a strange ontological realm there. I mean
no human being has seen what’s going on
on the dark side of Mercury or something.
Does that mean there are no beautiful
things there? I mean we’ve never been
to Pluto, do you think that Pluto has
no beauty?
But in a sense there is no beautiful thing
there until somebody sees it.
Well yes, do you think beauty has an
objective existence outside of humanity?
Uh- no.
Well, then if we die all beauty dies.
Beauty is something that we make when
we look at something. It’s not something
that’s there before we look at it.
Maybe so, but my own suspicion would
be that there are other animals and other
mammals, birds even, which have some
sort of inherent- not what we call aesthetic
sense, but they are doing this sort of thing
that we call aesthetics, they’re pre-lingual
things, but you know if you let a bird loose,
he’s going to go to the meadow with the
fl owers and trees, he’s not going to the
arctic wasteland unless he’s not an arctic
bird. So you know clearly he’s got some
kind of understanding of areas of the
planet that are inviting and pleasant to be
in. I don’t know, I mean I worry about the
traps set in that, because I think that there
are diffi culties in describing the beauty
of objet trouvée, you know found objects
which are done without artistic intention.
And you stumble across one, you know,
just the driftwood problem. Most driftwood
looks like junk, 90 percent of driftwood
is junk. Then every once in a while, you
fi nd a piece of driftwood that is really
evocative. There needs to be some kind
of vocabulary or to me it seems like there
ought to be a vocabulary in which you can
say that a piece of driftwood had aesthetic
merit that another piece of driftwood did
not, even there is no human creator or no
intentionality, what it would have is some
processuality.
Yes, but the junk and the beautiful piece
might have had the same processes
operate upon them.
They might indeed.
They might have been fl oating around the
ocean for the same amount of time, so
what makes one beautiful and the other
not beautiful?
Well, if I were Jared Tarbell, I think I would
tell you that it was something about the
iterative texture that made it beautiful. I
mean, why are the cracks in one piece of
mud beautiful while the cracks of billion
other pieces of mud not particularly
striking? It does something to our sense
you know. The most beautiful photograph
I think I’ve ever seen, and at least my
favourite photograph in the world is a
Man Ray photograph, and of course Man
Ray was a pal of Duchamp and he did
a lot of objet trouvée work- but it’s a
photograph of a dead leaf. And this leaf
is so unbelievably dead that you can’t
stop looking at it. It’s really wrinkled up in
a kind of organic ecstasy of death. He’s
gotten right in on it and he’s captured
every vein and every miserable crisping
of the thing, and even though it’s a leaf,
it’s a truly powerful surreal image. It’s like
the agony of some king, it’s overwhelming
in its aesthetic power. He didn’t paint it,
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4544
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he didn’t airbrush it, he was Man Ray and
when he saw a thing like that he had the
ability to recognise the potency of it.
So can we connect the eighteenth
century aestheticization of the landscape
and of the natural world in some ways?
Because the way you appreciate the alps
as the English did in the eighteenth and
nineteeth centuries, and suddenly start
to see sublime beauty in the alps, you’re
doing the same thing aren’t you? You’re
looking at the results of a process or a
series of processes, and you think “Wow,
that’s really beautiful.”
Maybe landscape appreciation has
something to do with it. But I really
suspect the processuality is kind of a
new thing in the world, that until we had
code we weren’t actually free to do that in
the same way like before the romantics,
people were unable to see the beauty in a
mountain range. They’re just saying, “its
cold up there, I don’t want to go, maybe
I’ll go goat hunting or gardening is much,
much nicer.”
And the parlour is nicer than the garden...
I think we may be hitting a native form
of twenty-fi rst century aesthetics here.
We are actually able to see the value of
process now.
Because we have a process machine,
and that allows us to go back and look
at processes that came before. I mean
yesterday we were talking about breeding
dogs. It seems to me a profoundly
generative thing to do.
In a way it’s like the early days of cinema
where you had these motion capture
things, and you were able to see the way
animals move or the way human beings
move, and you got Vorticism and Futurism
and this kind of dynamic abstraction,
where you suddenly had this machine
that made people aware that there
were aspects of motion or action that
were made visible to us and that had an
aesthetic quality. The ability to write code
and to generate code seems to be doing
a similar kind of thing.
What about the process versus the
product? You said in the brief for the
Fabrica borsisti that you are interested in
the process itself? But actually what gets
shown is usually not the process but the
end result of the process? Do you think
there is another level of generative art
where we can actually see the thing,
or we can look at the code for example?
Yes, well it has a dual face to it. I mean
if you’re doing good generative art you’re
defi nitely designing process. And the thing
about process is that you can run it again
and again and again.
And that’s a good reason to use cheap
materials because you’re going to be
doing it and you’ll say, “that one’s no good,
and that one’s no good, and that one’s
no good.” So I think there are two major
problems in that fi eld. It’s just hard to
write the code. It’s hard to start. It’s really
hard to stop. You just have to say, “Okay,
my process is done, it’s achieved, I’m not
going to tinker with it anymore, I made this,
this is a work of art for you, buy it, design it,
collect it…”
It’s really hard to stop.
The stopping is harder than the beginning,
and the beginning is very hard.
It’s an inherent part of these processes;
there is no reason to stop in a sense that
we have this concept of permanent beater
when we talk about Web 2.0 stuff, that’s
very real. That’s something I know from
my world.
The Internet was built without an off switch.
What’s inherent in coding is that you
don’t need to stop doing it. There’s always
something else to do, there’s always
something to add or tinker with or modify.
There is never an end to the question
“What if?”
Well, I think that is a very severe problem,
and you really need to tackle it head on.
I think we can stop.
Stopping is good! We’ve got to stop
somewhere! Pull the lever; it’s done!
Real artistship!
Bruce Sterling
Author, journalist, editor, and critic, was born in 1954.
Best known for his eight science fi ction novels, he also
writes short stories, book reviews, design criticism,
opinion columns, and introductions for books ranging
from Ernst Juenger to Jules Verne.
His nonfi ction works include The Hacker Crackdown:
Law and Disorder on The Electronic Frontier (1992),
Tomorrow Now: Envisioning The Next Fifty Years (2003)
and Shaping Things (2005).
He is a contributing editor of Wired magazine and a
columnist for Make magazine.
He also writes a weblog. During 2005, he was the
“Visionary in Residence” at Art Center College of Design
in Pasadena. In 2008 he was the Guest Curator for the
Share Festival of Digital Art and Culture in Torino, Italy.
He has appeared in ABC’s Nightline, BBC’s The Late
Show, CBC’s Morningside, on MTV and TechTV, and in
Time, Newsweek, The Wall Street Journal, the New York
Times, Fortune, Nature, I.D., Metropolis, Technology
Review, Der Spiegel, La Repubblica, and many
other venues.
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4746
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By Marco Mancuso
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This essay was written as a response to
“Designing processes rather than art” a
Fabrica Workshops project (November 2008)
directed by Bruce Sterling.
GENERATIVE NATURE
Aesthetics, repetitiveness, selection
and adaptation
In his De Rerum Natura, Lucretius denies
any kind of creation, providence and
original bliss and maintains that people
freed themselves from their condition
of need thanks to the production of
techniques, which are transpositions of
nature. A god and some gods exist, but
they did not create the universe, nor do
they deal with people’s actions. Lucretius
maintains that the rational knowledge of
nature shows us an infi nite universe that is
made up of complex forms and constituted
by atoms; it follows natural laws, it is
indifferent to people’s needs and can be
explained without gods.
When an artist uses a conceptual form of
art, it means that all of the planning and
decisions are made beforehand and the
execution is a perfunctory affair. The idea
becomes a machine that makes the art.
– Sol Le Witt
Modern ecology began with Charles
Darwin’s studies. In his “theory of evolution”
published in 1859 in On the Origin of
Species, he underlined the adaptation
of the different organisms to the various
kinds of environment, which are subjected
to the age-long examination of natural
selection. However, the word was coined by
Ernst Heinrich Haeckel in 1869 and comes
from the Greek óikos meaning “house” and
logos meaning “discourse”. It is therefore a
biological science that studies environment
and the relationships that the different
living organisms establish between each
other and with the environment itself. For
some time, Haeckel was a strong supporter
and popularizer of Darwin’s theories, but
he soon became one of his most bitter
enemies; he fi rmly refuted the process
of natural selection as the basis of the
evolutionary mechanism, in favor of a
thought that was more focused on the
environment as a direct agent on natural
organisms, which is able to produce new
species and generate diversity.
Ernst Heinrich Haeckel’s thought and work
represent the starting point of this critical
refl ection. First of all, because it was the
theoretical and practical cue suggested
by Bruce Sterling during his workshop for
48 49
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Fabrica, to which the text refers. Secondly;
because it allows me a philosophical
and critical refl ection, aspiring to fi nd a
possible point of contact between nature,
theories of evolution and programmatic and
generative art. Is it impossible? Well,
I would say no, on the contrary. Above all if
we try to compare and amalgamate, like the
colors on a canvas, the German biologist’s
research on one side with some works
of conceptual and minimalist artist Sol Le
Witt and the possible relationship between
mathematics and nature on the other,
and what is known today as art and
generative design.
Nature as an art
“Kunstformen der Natur” literally means
“artistic forms of nature”: this is the title
of biologist Ernst Haeckel’s 1898 most
important text, his most complex and
fascinating research. Moreover, this is
the text from which Bruce Sterling took,
for those participating in his workshop,
some primary images that could be the
graphic material and starting point for an
aesthetic and methodological refl ection on
the practices of generative repetitiveness.
By watching the richly decorated plates in
Haeckel’s text, it is undeniable that nature
is able not only to create spontaneously
real ‘art forms’, but also to produce
a direct correspondence between a certain
generative aesthetics, starting from
a fundamental unit/nucleus to come
to a complex entity, and a consequent
adaptive and evolutionary practice.
In other words, if the stages of the
embryological development of a species
actually trace the evolution phases that
led it to its position in the natural order,
the survival of each species basically
depends on its interaction with the
environment. According to Haeckel, the
mechanism thanks to which new species
and a new diversity have origin is that of a
gradual addition of a certain development
trajectory starting from an initial unit,
which is determined by imposed external
(environmental) parameters, which are able
to infl uence the gradual direction of the
trajectory itself.
At this point, a fi rst important reference to
the theoretic and methodological bases of
Generative Art seems evident, as one of the
pioneers of this discipline, Italian architect
Celestino Soddu, suggests, “Generative
Art is the idea realized as genetic code of
artifi cial events, as construction of dynamic
complex systems able to generate endless
variations. Each Generative Project is a
concept-software that works producing
unique and non-repeatable events, as
possible and manifold expressions of the
generating idea strongly recognizable as
a vision belonging to an artist/designer/
musician/architect/mathematician. This
generative Idea/human-creative-act
makes an unpredictable, amazing and
endless expansion of human creativity.
Computers are simply the tools for its
storage in memory and execution. This
approach opens a new era in Art, Design
and Communication: the challenge of a
new naturalness of the artifi cial event as a
mirror of Nature. Once more man emulates
Nature, as in the act of making Art […].”
Although, over the centuries, biologists
and morphologists have widely denied
a so close correspondence between
ontogenesis and phylogeny, and so
between unity and complexity, the germ of
thought is interesting and I think it is worth
continuing to nourish it…
Forms, colors, lines and instructions
As everybody knows, US conceptual
and minimalist artist Sol Le Witt, who
died not long ago, is one of the spiritual
fathers of modern artists and generative
designers. By reducing art to a series of
instructions thanks to which everybody is
able to draw forms, colors and lines in the
two-dimensional and three-dimensional
space, creating geometric elements that
are repeated and modulated according to
standard space proportions, Le Witt loved
reminding that “all the people are able
to participate in the creative process, to
become artists themselves”. It is well-
known that the artist tended to separate
the planning stage from the realization of
the work; he devoted himself to the former,
whereas his assistants devoted themselves
to the latter: if the artistic process thus
lies in the conceptual planning of the work,
the (basic, elementary and geometric)
execution can be carried out by everybody,
thanks to a series of detailed instructions
that are suggested by a thinking unit with
a procedural approach. He also claimed,
“There are several ways of constructing a
work of art. One is by making decisions at
each step, another by making a system to
make decisions.”
In this kind of approach the work of the
last years of some of the most important
generative artists and designers in the
world (Casey Reas, Ben Fry, Jared Tarbell,
Theodore Watson, Lia, Toxi, Andreas
Schlegel, Marius Watz, Robert Hodgin, to
mention only some of them) is refl ected: if
the human being identifi es himself/herself
with the author of a series of mathematical
instructions that can be suggested to a
computer, the resulting work of art will
be the sum of the operations that the
computer has carried out autonomously.
Therefore, as for Sol Le Witt the emotional
elements of the authors, their joy at a
moment, their frustration, their apathy
were constituent elements of a free
interpretation of the instructions that had
been suggested to them and so of the
resulting work of art, in the universe of
digital software as well (from Processing
to VVVV to Open Frameworks, to mention
the most widespread) we can hazard the
thought that the instructions given by the
artist/designer can be freely
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50 51
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interpreted by a kind of ‘emotiveness’
of the ‘thinking’ computer.
Le Witt’s conceptual indifference to any
kind of aesthetic judgement, the aversion
to prearranged aesthetic conventions that
are assimilated by the public, a general
indifference to any kind of distinction
between old and new are perfectly refl ected
in the words of one of the most important
generative artists in Italy, Fabio Franchino,
“In the evening I give some instructions to
the computer, which processes data and
autonomously generates lines, forms and
colours during the night; in the morning,
when I wake up, I judge the results. If I
like the product I will keep it, if it is not
satisfying I will throw it.”
Well, I do not know what these things
suggest to you: I think that also in this
case we can make a comparison with
the natural universe. If we assimilate the
environment, nature in its widest meaning,
as the entity that is able to cause a series
of changes, evolutions and dynamics,
then the organisms living in contact with
it (again, the concept of ‘ecology’) are able
to interpret these vital codes, to assimilate
them, in order to react to them and
autonomously generate a series of forms,
colors and systems that can be seen as the
result of their evolutionary process, which
comes to a complex fi nal system from a
starting unit. The difference maybe lies in
the ‘spontaneity’ with which this process
begins: if an artist/designer decides, in
advance, a series of instructions that will
be given to the computer, it is diffi cult not
to think that nature operates by following
only its evolutionary spontaneity. At the
same time, it is fascinating even to think
that as the artist/designer does not know
the fi nal effects of the instructions, giving
the computer the freedom to interpret
them, similarly nature does not care about
the effects it produces on the organisms
living in it, giving them evolutionary freedom
of forms and elements that we, human
beings, only afterwards could maybe
consider as ‘works of art.’
Numbers in evolution
Today, one of the most fascinating
mathematical theories is undoubtedly that
of fractals: according to the defi nition of
their discoverer, Polish mathematician
Benoît Mandelbrot, they are geometric
shapes, characterized by the endless
repetition of the same pattern at ever
smaller scales. This is the most intuitive
defi nition that can be given to shapes that
exist in nature in an impressive number but
do not still have a precise mathematical
defi nition. The natural universe is rich
in forms that are very similar to fractals,
forms that do not follow the norms of the
Euclidean geometry: a stretch of coast, the
branches or the roots of a tree, a cloud, the
snowfl akes, the ramifi cations of a lightning
and the dentation of a leaf are example of
fractal forms originating spontaneously in
nature. Among these, the fractal form par
excellence is the spiral, the constituent
element of the shell of many annelids
and conches, which is one of the main
objects of study of Ernst Heinrich Haeckel’s
theories and one of the most beautiful and
fascinating geometric forms.
If we shift the fi eld of analysis to
mathematics, to numbers, to equations
and algorithms, the level of intersection
between science, technology, art and
nature does not change. And if the
procedural and generative method is what
we have chosen as the guiding element
of this treatise, it is not surprising to think
that the construction of fractals follows a
reiterated process, that is, the repetition
of a starting element for a theoretically
infi nite number of times until, after a while,
the human eye cannot distinguish the
changes in the starting element any longer.
We must not forget the fact that, as it is
acknowledged, fractals are infl uenced
by certain controlled casualness. There
is thus again the element of casualness,
of spontaneity, as the distinctive (or
unifying) element between computer and
nature, according to which evolutionary
mechanisms cannot be predicted from
their constituent elements and it is often
impossible to reconstruct them, starting
from their visible manifestations.
At this point of the text, the procedural,
generative, iterative and evolutionary
element may be considered as the pillar
of the thought underpinning a modern
‘computational ecology’: between Turing’s
revolutionary theories on morphogenesis
(every living organism is able to develop
complex bodies, starting from extremely
simple elements and basing on processes
of self-assembly, without the aid of a guide
following a prearranged plan) and the most
recent studies that have been carried out
on genetic algorithms (a particular class of
evolutionary algorithms using techniques
of mutation, selection and recombination,
so that a certain population of abstract
representations of possible solutions to an
optimization problem evolves into better
solutions) almost fi fty years of studies,
analyses and research passed; they aimed
at underlining the nearly computational
properties of Mother Nature on one side,
and the ability of digital machines to
simulate and repeat complex natural
phenomena. Frankly, I do not wonder any
longer what is the most fascinating form
of art or the most diffi cult process…
Moreover, I think that the most interesting
answers to these themes can be found in
the studies and theories of Karl Sims, the
famous artist and researcher from Mit Media
Lab; in particular, we can fi nd them in his
1993 work, Genetic Images, which drew
inspiration from his paper Artifi cial Evolution
of Computer Graphics, where he described
the application of the genetic algorithms
for the generation of 2D abstract images,
starting from complex mathematical
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52 53
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formulas. Therefore according to
Sims, Darwin’s evolutionary theories
can be simulated by means of a generative
software or appropriate mathematical
algorithms; in this way, “populations
of virtual entities specifi ed by coded
descriptions in the computer can be
evolved by applying these same natural
rules of variation and selection.
The defi nition of fi tness can even be altered
as the programmer desires.” I think that
what is interesting in Genetic Images is
the fact that this work was presented as
an interactive installation: in other words,
it was the public who could choose and
select the most interesting images and
forms from an aesthetic point of view,
among those generated by a computer
simulating a process of artifi cial evolution.
The selected images were then recombined
by the computer to create new ones, basing
on alteration and mutation methods,
similar to those of natural species during
their evolutionary process. Karl Sims
thus wonders whether these interactive
evolutions can be considered a creative
process. If yes, is it the public who develop
an independent creative attitude or is
the presence of a designer making the
computer follow precise creative paths
necessary? Or is it maybe the computer that
develops autonomous creative tendencies?
In his treatise, Sims duly mentions biologist
Richard Dawkins who, in his book The
Blind Watchmaker, talks about the ability
of natural evolutionary processes to
create complex forms without the external
presence of any designer or programmer:
“It is thus possible that these generative
techniques challenge an important
aspect of our anthropocentric tendencies,
according to which it is diffi cult for us to
believe that we are planned not by a God
but by casualness showing through the
codes of a natural evolution,” concludes
Sims. Maybe true art lies exactly
in all these things.
http://caliban.mpiz-koeln.mpg.de/~stueber/haeckel/
kunstformen/natur.html
http://www.fl ickr.com/photos/origomi/
sets/72157601323433758/
http://www.celestinosoddu.com/
http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beno%C3%AEt_Mandelbrot
http://www.karlsims.com/genetic-images.html
Marco Mancuso
Critic, art curator and consultant for new media, digital
art and electronic culture, with a focus on contemporary
audiovisual art and design.
He is founder and director of the DigiCult project,
based on the active participation of forty professionals,
that represent the fi rst Italian-wide network of
journalists, curators, artists and critics in the fi eld of
electronic culture.
Mancuso is working with the new born agency DigiMade
as curator/promoter for several Italian artists and
teaches at NABA (New Academy of Fine Arts) and at IED
(European Institute of Design) in Milan.
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54 55
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56 57
Work in progess.
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58 59
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6160
Final presentation.
Guest commenter Marco Mancuso.
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Contents
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Workshop participants
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62
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Designing Processes Rather Than Art
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A Fabrica Workshops project
directed by Bruce Sterling
Guest commenter Marco Mancuso
November 25th - November 28th 2008
Fabrica Workshops program director:
Omar Vulpinari
Coordination:
Barbara Liverotti, Serena Cortella
Photography:
Mauro Bedoni, Piero Martinello,
Gustavo Millon, Sebastiano Scattolin
Video:
Alessandro Favaron with Chiara Andrich,
Heloisa Sartorato
Technical assistance:
Luciano Alban, Stefano Bosco, Daniela Mesina
Web design:
Paolo Eramo
Designing Processes Rather Than Art booklet
Design:
Lars Wannop, Daniel Streat
Texts:
Elisa De Martini, Phoebe Mutetsi
Production:
Daniela Mesina
© Fabrica 2009
Thanks to:
Laura Pollini, Sam Baron, Enrico Bossan,
Andy Cameron, Federico Mariotto, Babak Payami
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Contact
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Michela Liverotti
tel. +39 0422 516272 - fax +39 0422 516347
www.fabrica.it/workshops
Fabrica
via Ferrarezza
31020 Catena di Villorba - Treviso, Italy
Fabrica
is the communication research center
of the Benetton Group.
63
04 Foreword
06 Brief
12 Output
38 Interview
49 Essay
56 Gallery
Hanna Abi-Hanna, Fernando Acquarone,
Namyoung An, Diego Beyrò,
Lawrence Blankenbyl, Vendi Budic,
Víctor Hugo Cabañas, Gonzalo Campos,
Simone Cannolicchio, Pau Casals,
Tak Cheung, Lizy Cretney,
Mariana Eggers Giannone, Clara Failla,
Lorenzo Fanton, Jade Follawi,
Gabo Gesualdi, Elena Gianni,
Valerie Gudenus, Joshua Levi,
Julian Koschwicz, Christopher Knowles,
Gustavo Millon, Francesco Novara,
Sanji Petrovic, Martina Stancati,
Jacqueline Steck, Nora Vegas,
Vincent Van Uffelen, Geremia Vinattieri,
Lars Wannop, Patrick Waterhouse,
Joao H. Wilbert
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The title of this workshop and lecture program is rooted
in Fabrica’s heritage of cross-cultural creativity for social
concern. Its precise defi nition however emerges directly
from a recent debate between Fabrica’s researchers that
had the specifi c objective to identify common interest
platforms for future studies.
Environmental, social and relational themes are
central to human ecology, a transdisciplinary fi eld using
holistic approaches in the search for harmony between
people and their natural and created environment but
mainly between people and their societies.
Along these lines Fabrica wants to investigate,
experiment, catalyze, document and disseminate how
contemporary communication, design and artistic
expression can contribute to helping people solve
problems and enhance human potential, within near and
far environments.
The workshop series will bring to Fabrica international
creatives from all fi elds of communication, design
and technology who share a common desire to apply
innovation to social improvement.
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www.fabrica.it/workshops
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-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------Environmental, Social, Relational
