Re-Coded

In Recreating the Past, we study computational art from the past decades and co-create our own computational art histories through recreating the works of artists who inspire us. We use contemporary techniques to gain aesthetic, analytical, and technical knowledge, and study the contexts from which these artists’ works emerged to better understand the politics, communities of practice, and social and artistic movements they engaged in.

By recreating historic works, we learn what modern tools and approaches have to offer. Through our focus on the building blocks of media art, generative design practice, and computational techniques such as algorithmic composition, typography, imaging, computer vision, and interaction design, the class encourages critical inquiry into what constitutes the canon of computational art by re-verbing “recreating” to take on different forms: reproducing, reenacting, rethinking and reframing. Participants were given a toolkit featuring a series of exercises and questions to unpack and expand on the themes, techniques, and communities of practice engaged by artists. Participants were encouraged to bring their own artists not only to compile a more inclusive list of artists and designers working in and around computation but inspire new generations of computational artists well versed in diverse computational art histories and practices.