2016
Diploma thesis
University for Art and Design, Offenbach am Main
Algorithms are regarded as an independent technology. Vague are components of algorithmic meshes which include indetermination: due to the detachment from concrete phenomena one algorithm can serve different functions; vast data structures of neuronal networks elude the human capable determinability; there is a leeway between theoretical notation and practical execution; through the interaction of several algorithms these might be able to elude its intended purpose.
Since Baumgartens foundation of the aesthetics as a philosophic discipline, vagueness is a fundamental attribute in an aesthetic experience between subject and object. The object, through its sensuous phenomena, eludes a definite determination, in fact it triggers new attempts of determination continually. Algorithms in contrast operate below the surface and are particularly invisible and silent. If one deals in a successful manner with them through art, algorithms appear in perceivable phenomena and enable an aesthetic play. Art can offer an leeway of vagueness, which isn’t given in function-oriented daily routine. Subject as well as object are taken into account: an indeterminate access from the subject – free from an external determination of benefit, as well as an indeterminate objective mode of operation – the contact between object and environment isn’t fully controlled by the subject. Algorithmic processes, whose if-then-logic isn’t explorable in daily routine, becomes explorable in an aesthetic perspective through art.