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MAT 256 Visual Design through Algorithms
Lecture 3: 256 Information & Art
Media Arts and Technology
Graduate Program
UC Santa Barbara
Winter 2006
MAT 256 Visual Design through Algorithms
Communication (Weaver)
 When a truck picks up a cargo in New Orleans
and delivers it to Baltimore, communication has
happened.
 When someone steps out onto the beach and the
salt air touches their nose and the smell of the
ocean comes into their mind, communication has
happened.
 When two stray cats meet for sex in an alley in
Los Angeles, communication has happened.
 When a child having breakfast in Phoenix and
reads the back of a cereal box, communication
has happened.
Media Arts and Technology
Graduate Program
UC Santa Barbara
 When a computer in New York City calls up a
computer in Tokyo and transmits a message,
communication has happened
Winter 2006
MAT 256 Visual Design through Algorithms
3 Levels of Communication (Weaver)
TECHNICAL:
 How accurately can the symbols of communication be
transmitted?
 Concerned with the accuracy of the transfer
SEMANTIC: How precisely do the transmitted symbols
convey the desired meaning?
 Concerned with satisfactorily close approximation in the
interpretation of meaning by the receiver, as compared
with the intended meaning of the sender
Media Arts and Technology
Graduate Program
UC Santa Barbara
EFFECTIVENESS:
 How effectively does the received meaning affect conduct
in the desired way?
 Problem of effectiveness involves aesthetic considerations
in fine arts
 Involves mechanics of style, psychological, emotional
aspects and other values
Winter 2006
MAT 256 Visual Design through Algorithms
Shannon’s Information Theory
 Applies only to the technical problem of accuracy
 But impact on semantic and effectiveness
 Any limitations in A impacts on B and C
 Weaver argues that A is also a theory of B and C
Media Arts and Technology
Graduate Program
UC Santa Barbara
Winter 2006
MAT 256 Visual Design through Algorithms
Information & Meaning
 In Information Theory, information not to be
confused with meaning
 Meaning and nonsense may have equivalent
information value
 Semantic aspects irrelevant to the engineering
aspects
 “Not what you say, but what you could say”
 Information, a measure of one’s freedom of choice
when selecting a message
Media Arts and Technology
Graduate Program
UC Santa Barbara
 More information with greater the choices
Winter 2006
MAT 256 Visual Design through Algorithms
For Later Discussion (p10-19)
 Probability, Entropy potential for artistic procedure
 Markov Processes
 Noise
Media Arts and Technology
Graduate Program
UC Santa Barbara
Winter 2006
MAT 256 Visual Design through Algorithms
Weaver: Semantic Receiver, Semantic noise
 Semantic receiver inserted between message and
receiver subjects message to 2nd level decoding
 Match between statistical semantic characteristics of
message to the totality of receivers
 Semantic noise inserted between message and
transmitter
 Decoding must take this into account
 Sum of message meaning + semantic noise =
desired total message
Media Arts and Technology
Graduate Program
UC Santa Barbara
Winter 2006
MAT 256 Visual Design through Algorithms
Capacity Issues
 Error and confusion arise, fidelity decreases with too
much info through a channel
 Take into account capacity of channel, but also
capacity of receiver/audience
Media Arts and Technology
Graduate Program
UC Santa Barbara
Winter 2006
MAT 256 Visual Design through Algorithms
Information Theory for Art (to be further dev…)
 A model with recognizable features (signal, noise,
order, chaos, transmission, encoding, decoding,
reception)
 Relationship of Signal to Noise has metaphoric
potential (art allows for deviation, re-interpretation,
metaphoric appropriation)
 Art leans towards noise, or the play between signal
and noise as aesthetic material
Media Arts and Technology
Graduate Program
UC Santa Barbara
 Information Theory provides methodologies by
which to address semantic interpretation (Humanities
studies cultural interpretation of messages)
Winter 2006
MAT 256 Visual Design through Algorithms
Historical Transition in Artistic Visualization

Second industrial revolution (1850 onwards) displaced
the historical function of painting to visually represent
the world

Culprits: camera (realistic optical representation),
lithographic printing press (multiplicity), railway
system (access to other places, countryside, etc.)

Painting had to reinvent itself. Shifted focus to the
language of painting, and the logical perspective of the
artist rather then the world
Media Arts and Technology
Graduate Program
UC Santa Barbara

Monet Haystacks at Sunrise Series, 1890-1981
Winter 2006
MAT 256 Visual Design through Algorithms
Abstraction

Art & Painting Became Abstract in the 1910’s

Kazimir Malevich, Soviet Constructivism, 1910

Marcel Duchamp, Fountain, Conceptual, 1917

Luigi Russolo, Art of Noise, Futurism, 1930’s (sound)

Jackson Pollock, Abstract Expressionism, 1940s
Media Arts and Technology
Graduate Program
UC Santa Barbara
Winter 2006
MAT 256 Visual Design through Algorithms
Art & Chance-Imagery

“A throw of the dice will never abolish chance”,
Mallarme, symbolist poet (1842-1898)

Marcel Duchamp: 3 Standard Stoppages, 1913,
(mechanical chance processes)

Duchamp dropped three threads, each a meter long, on
to the same number of Prussian blue cloths/canvas.
Then they were stuck to the surfaces without any
adjustments to the curves that chance dictated they
fell into. He then cut up the cloth and stuck it to glass
Media Arts and Technology
Graduate Program
UC Santa Barbara
plates
Winter 2006
MAT 256 Visual Design through Algorithms
George Brecht, in “Chance-Imagery” (1957)

Fluxus artist addresses the role of chance in art

Chance-images characterized by lack of conscious
design, a method to override subjectivity

Aesthetic decisions through tossing of coin, dice:
visual form developed through consecutive sets of two
random numbers (RAND Corp, published numbers)

Chance: a means to attain greater generality

http://www.ubu.com/historical/gb/brecht_chance.pdf
Media Arts and Technology
Graduate Program
UC Santa Barbara
Winter 2006
MAT 256 Visual Design through Algorithms
Artistic Possibilities
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John Simon http://www.numeral.com/eicon.html
http://www.earstudio.com/projects/listeningpost.html?
middle=listening_middle.html (Listening Post)
http://textarc.org/ (Paley)
http://www.marumushi.com/apps/newsmap/
http://www.txtkit.sw.ofcd.com/
http://jevbratt.com/projects.html
http://128.111.69.4/~jevbratt/1_to_1/3/migration/
http://www.ima.fa.geidai.ac.jp/trdproj/TAP2000E/trap/nishijima.html
http://images.google.com/images?q=particle+tracks&ie
=ISO-8859-1&hl=en (particle tracking)
http://www.cybergeography.org/atlas/info_spaces.html
Media Arts and Technology
Graduate Program
UC Santa Barbara
Winter 2006