From Fingers to Digits

An Artificial Aesthetic

Part of Leonardo

Ebook
On sale Jul 16, 2019 | 392 Pages | 9780262352109
Essays on computer art and its relation to more traditional art, by a pioneering practitioner and a philosopher of artificial intelligence.

In From Fingers to Digits, a practicing artist and a philosopher examine computer art and how it has been both accepted and rejected by the mainstream art world. In a series of essays, Margaret Boden, a philosopher and expert in artificial intelligence, and Ernest Edmonds, a pioneering and internationally recognized computer artist, grapple with key questions about the aesthetics of computer art. Other modern technologies—photography and film—have been accepted by critics as ways of doing art. Does the use of computers compromise computer art's aesthetic credentials in ways that the use of cameras does not? Is writing a computer program equivalent to painting with a brush?

Essays by Boden identify types of computer art, describe the study of creativity in AI, and explore links between computer art and traditional views in philosophical aesthetics. Essays by Edmonds offer a practitioner's perspective, considering, among other things, how the experience of creating computer art compares to that of traditional art making. Finally, the book presents interviews in which contemporary computer artists offer a wide range of comments on the issues raised in Boden's and Edmonds's essays.

Margaret A. Boden is Research Professor of Cognitive Science at the University of Sussex. She is the author of Artificial Intelligence and Natural Man, expanded second edition (MIT Press), AI: Its Nature and Future, The Creative Mind, and other books. She was the 2018 recipient of the ACM-AAAI Allen Newell Award for contributions to the philosophy of cognitive science.

Ernest Edmonds is an artist who has pioneered the use of computers and computational ideas in his art. He has exhibited in the US, UK, Australia, Russia, China, and many other countries. He is the author of The Art of Interaction: What HCI Can Learn from Interactive Art, and other books. He was awarded the 2017 ACM SIGGRAPH Distinguished Artist Award for Lifetime Achievement in Digital Art.

About

Essays on computer art and its relation to more traditional art, by a pioneering practitioner and a philosopher of artificial intelligence.

In From Fingers to Digits, a practicing artist and a philosopher examine computer art and how it has been both accepted and rejected by the mainstream art world. In a series of essays, Margaret Boden, a philosopher and expert in artificial intelligence, and Ernest Edmonds, a pioneering and internationally recognized computer artist, grapple with key questions about the aesthetics of computer art. Other modern technologies—photography and film—have been accepted by critics as ways of doing art. Does the use of computers compromise computer art's aesthetic credentials in ways that the use of cameras does not? Is writing a computer program equivalent to painting with a brush?

Essays by Boden identify types of computer art, describe the study of creativity in AI, and explore links between computer art and traditional views in philosophical aesthetics. Essays by Edmonds offer a practitioner's perspective, considering, among other things, how the experience of creating computer art compares to that of traditional art making. Finally, the book presents interviews in which contemporary computer artists offer a wide range of comments on the issues raised in Boden's and Edmonds's essays.

Author

Margaret A. Boden is Research Professor of Cognitive Science at the University of Sussex. She is the author of Artificial Intelligence and Natural Man, expanded second edition (MIT Press), AI: Its Nature and Future, The Creative Mind, and other books. She was the 2018 recipient of the ACM-AAAI Allen Newell Award for contributions to the philosophy of cognitive science.

Ernest Edmonds is an artist who has pioneered the use of computers and computational ideas in his art. He has exhibited in the US, UK, Australia, Russia, China, and many other countries. He is the author of The Art of Interaction: What HCI Can Learn from Interactive Art, and other books. He was awarded the 2017 ACM SIGGRAPH Distinguished Artist Award for Lifetime Achievement in Digital Art.

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