Genealogy of Generative Art

Generativity and creativity are for me synonymous, and both terms ultimately resolve to entering into dialogue with the world. I tend to associate generative, creative, dialogic methodology with Leonardo, who according to legend looked closely at things like water-stained plaster walls and related sorts of phenomena to see what kinds of forms or images might exist-in and/or emerge-from them. In the terms I'm setting up here, he entered into dialogue with such phenomena, and these instances constitute creative acts that might (or might not) have been redoubled or iterated by him into artworks (or passages thereof) at later points in time.

In drawings and preparatory works Leonardo would apparently create his own equivalents of water-stained walls by building up rich and varied loams of texture and pattern as a matrix or ground from which an image or figure would emerge. (The Leonardo drawing below illustrates this.) One way or another, it seems to me Leonardo established basic conditions of dialogue --between stained walls and emergent forms, between textured and patterned grounds and emergent figures.



For me this entering into dialogue is the essence of generativity or creativity, and it is independent of materials or profession. Leonardo illustrates this by working, as he did, with a variety of materials and for a variety of purposes (scientific and technological as well as artistic). But children illustrate it just as well when they enter into dialogue with and see shapes in clouds. Verbal conversations at any age routinely generate emergent figures such as insights or understandings. In terms of the GenArt course we've established a ground of industrial materials and social interactions by entering into dialogue with these materials and formations, and out of this ground have emerged forms or figures. Different materials. Different purposes. Different grounds. Same process.

I tend to call the process entering into dialogue but it could just as well be called immersion. If you click on the thumbnail picture of text below you will see an enlarged, readable version of text by an author who is comparing the aesthetic views of a particular philosopher with Leonardo's 'brainstorming' drawings in terms of "...an immersion into the creative mix" .



When I was immersed in the activity of making paintings I would build up many layers of paint and line by repeatedly turning a canvas 90 degrees, adding layers of color and shape, and articulating possibly-emergent forms or figures with line. Eventually I began to experience the same dynamic in different contexts (dialogic writing is one such context for me, teaching is another).

So for me the creative or generative process involves entering into dialogic or immersive relations that, in turn, establish creative ground.