See my complete list of writings here...
2009 "Computer Baroque: Computer Animation 1987-1995"

Essay and programme notes to accompany Computer Baroque screening: http://www.animateprojects.org/films/by_project/computer_baroque/baroque.

This is the online essay and programme notes I wrote to accompany the 'Computer Baroque' screening of mid-period computer animation, organised with Animate Projects. The first screening was at Tate Modern, London on 20th March 2009 and thereafter online at www.animateprojects.org from 14th April to 14th July 2009. It was a 'big hit', apparently.

Download the illustrated essay here (.PDF 250K)
Download the programme notes here (.PDF
25K)
 
2008 "Getting Closer to Bigger Screens"

Review of Urbanscreens for: MUTE www.metamute.org/en/Getting-Closer-to-Bigger-Screens.

Here's my review of the UrbanScreens conference and exhibtion in Manchester in 2008. I try to balance the debates about national policy with what is actually happening on the ground - what is it like to watch a huge screen perched on stilts in the the middle of a shoppping centre .

Download the full illustrated text here (.PDF 175K)
 
2008 "Data Visualisation"

Chapter for: Software Studies, Matthew Fuller (ed), MIT Press, 2008.

Matthew asked me to contribute to his new 'counter cultural guide to the elements of software' - a sort of alternative encyclopeadia of programming. I chose something visual as opposed to the other more weighty theoretical texts and argued a definition of visualisation to cover both art and science. It's pretty!

Download the full illustrated text here (.PDF 419K)

2008 "From System to Software: Computer Programming and the Death of Constructivist Art"

Essay for: White Heat, Cold Logic (ed.) Charlie Gere at al, Birkbeck College and MIT Press 2008.

An ambitious history of the 'programatic' in modern art as exemplified by Constructivism. Why didn't the Constructivists learn to program computers? Commissioned by Charlie Gere for their CACHe anthology on the early history of computer art in Britain. Quite a lot of fun to write and some great hair styles. Part funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Board (again).

Download the full illustrated text here (.PDF 2,756K)
Download text only here (.doc 117K)

2006 "WAX"

Entry for: "Getting Animated", Time Out: 1000 Films to Change Your Life. Time Out Guides, 2006. p 101.

I was asked to contribute a short piece on a film that had influenced my work so I chose David Blairs "WAX: or the Discovery of Television Among the Bees" from 1991. Feeling pleased that I had used this opportunity to show how poorly contemporary digital animation measured up to work of the recent past, I was shocked to discover that they had edited it down from 500 words to barely 100. So here is the original unexpurgated version.

Download the full illustrated text here (.PDF 35K)


 

2005  "The Death of the Death of the Portrait"

Review of About Face, Hayward Gallery. In: MUTE, no. 29, winter/spring 2005.

A review of a show at the Hayward Gallery that I thought I'd include as it contains some ideas that I intend to develop. That's a identikit type portrait of me on the left, by the way...

Download the text here (.doc 267K)


2004  "Software Art After Programming"

Feature Article for: MUTE, no.28, spring 2004.

An article I did on the history of software based art and how it was affected by the revolution in mass computing and the popularisation of the internet. Not as dull as it sounds. Has reappeared on various web sites, etc. Part funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Board.

Download the full illustrated text here (.PDF 1,546K)
2003  "Waking Up from Cinema"

Feature Article for: Vertigo, Vol 2 no. 4, spring 2003.

An article comparing computer animation to live action in two contrasting films - Richard Linklater's "Waking Life" and Hironobu Sakaguchi's "Final Fantasy".
Part funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Board.


Download the full illustrated text here (.PDF 1,094K)
2000  “Programming with a Paintbrush: The Last Interactive Workstation”

Essay published in: Filmwaves, no 12, Autumn 2000.

An essay I wrote in 1999 about the demise of the old Quantel postproduction systems as one of the last alternatives to the standard desktop interface. Written just before the cultural analysis of software became the Next Big Thing. The full version here was never published (probably because cultural critics don't actually use software except for MS Word).

Download the full illustrated text here (.PDF 1,284K)

BITPLANE, 1997
Bureau of Inverse
Technology
2000  “Artists as Workers and Technology as Artists: Critical Artists Devolve to Political Technologies”

Review of "Critical Images II: DVolution!" symposium at the LUX Centre, May 2000. Published in: Variant, no 11, summer 2000.

A review of a conference on artists moving image and new media that degenerated into a deference to the critical potential of new technologies seemingly without the necessity for the artists intentions. A slightly idealistic attitude was in evidence.

Download the text here (.doc 34K)

Mike Figgis: nice block,
shame about the perm.
2000  “Preserving Cultural Cinema while the World Moves On…”

Review of “Art Cinema: where next?”, 9th October, 1999, ICA and "By Any Means Necessary: Getting Cultural Cinema onto the Big Screen", 13th Nov, 1999, LUX (London Film Festival). Published in: Filmwaves, no 10, Winter 2000.

A review of two symposia that explored a number of assumptions about what 'art cinema' is for and why anyone should bother to pay to see it.

Download the text here (.doc 35K)

Brecht's Epic Theatre

1998  "New Media, Old Technology"

Article published in Variant, vol 2, no 6, Autumn 1998. And Readme! Filtered by Nettime, Ed. by Bosma et al, Autonomedia, 1998.

An article I wrote at the height of New Media Art's transcendency, questioning the relationship between cultural innovation and technological innovation. Was quite popular on mailing lists at the time, so I was told.

Download the text here (.doc 42K)


'LMX Spiral'
was my PhD thesis
you know

1998  "Montage - Allegory - Transformation: A Study of Digital Imaging in Dialectical Film Making"

Unpublished PhD thesis, 1998.


This was the theoretical submission for a practical PhD so it tends to describe my own film making practice in tortuous detail. The theoretical thesis was that digital transformation is taking over from montage as the dominant aesthetic technique. If you really want to read a copy then get in touch - it's a bit too big to stick on the web site (~14Mb).

Download the introduction here (.doc 46K)


Darrell Viner 1974
1996  "More Power: The Pioneers of British Computer Animation and their Legacy"

Paper published in Diverse Practices: A Critical Reader on British Video Art (ed.) by Julia Knight, Arts Council of England and University of Luton Press, 1996.

The first critical history of artists and computer animation in Britain. I attempt to answer the question - why did computer animation disappear during the seventies and then reappear during the eighties as 3D flying logos? (A precursor to my more recent "From System to Software").

Download the full illustrated text here (.PDF 719K)

1996  "Art and Science in Chaos : Contesting Readings of Scientific Visualisation"

Published in Futurenatural, (ed.) by Robertson, Mash et al. Routledge, 1996.

My last paper on scientific imagery and culture in which I look at the way fractals escaped from science and became a cultural phenomenon by the late eighties. I took my name from the title of this anthology, incidently.

Download the full illustrated text here (.PDF 774K)


This started it all...
1995  "Towards a Poetics of Knowledge"

Essay published in Digital Salon, (ed.) by Tim Binkley and Antoinette LaFarge, catalogue published in Leonardo, Vol 28, No. 5, 1995.

Another essay in which I explore the idea that scientific knowledge can take on cultural meaning through the medium of scientific imagery. Could this lead to a form of epistemological art? Or just a cool music video?

Download the full illustrated text here (.PDF 511K)
1995  "Technology is the Peoples Friend. Computers, Class and the New Cultural Politics"

Essay published in Critical Issues in Electronic Media, (ed.) by Simon Penny, SUNY, 1995.

A more detailed essay on the conflicts that were starting to result when artists tried to gain legitimacy for their digital practice as either proper art, trendy media or just a hobby. Men in polo necked sweaters were furrowing their brows... (This was also the first time I featured Graham Harwood's work who at the time was making digital comic books - see left).

Download the full illustrated text here (.PDF 602K)
1995  "Its Just Like Art : Notes on Computers, Class and Cultural Positioning".

Essay published in Millenium Film Journal, 28, Spring 1995.

A piece testing theories of "high" and "low" culture as applied to new forms of electronic media. At the time, shoot-em-up computer games were being attacked and some of us questioned this rush to condemn every new genre. Now "Doom" is acknowledged as a classic of course...

Download the full illustrated text here (.PDF 1,053K)

Thank you for not
laughing at my horse
1993  "Soft Future"

Essay published in Video Positive '93 exhibition catalogue (as Variant no.14), Liverpool, May 1993. Also in 'Machine Culture: The Virtual Frontier' (ed.) Simon Penny, in Visual Proceedings, ACM SIGGRAPH '93, Anaheim U.S.A.

Essay about how the most advanced technology is now used to make images of the space age utopia that we were promised technology would deliver. This piece got quite popular and was republished at least twice.

Download the text here (.doc 45K)
1990  "Computer Graphics as Allegorical Knowledge - Electronic Imagery in the Sciences"

Paper published in: Digital Image, Digital Cinema. SIGGRAPH '90 Art Show catalogue, Dallas, U.S.A.

My first major paper about the impact of electronic visualisation on science and culture - arguing that imagery now constitutes scientific knowledge and makes it more reliant on methods associated with artistic practice. I carried on writing on this subject for a few years but it was hard to find a platform for it.

Download the full illustrated text here (.PDF 2,193K)
top
Here's a selected
list of most of my published writings.
The major pieces
have individual
sections above.
2009

2008

2008


2008
2006

2005 2004
2003
2000
2000
2000
2000
2000
1999
1998

1998
1998

1997

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1996

1995

1995

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1993
1991
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1990
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1989

1989

1988
"Computer Baroque: Computer Animation 1987-1995", essay to accompany Computer Baroque screening: http://www.animateprojects.org/films/by_project/computer_baroque/baroque.
 "Getting Closer to Bigger Screens" (review article)
Review of Urbanscreens for: MUTE www.metamute.org/en/Getting-Closer-to-Bigger-Screens.

From System to Software: Computer Programming and the death of Constructivist Art”.
To be published in “White Heat, Cold Logic”, (ed.) by Charlie Gere et al, CACHe, Birkbeck College and MIT Press.
"Data Visualisation". To be published in "Software Studies", Matthew Fuller (ed), MIT Press 2007.

"WAX". In: "Getting Animated", "Time Out: 1000 Films to Change Your Life". Time Out Guides, 2006.

The Death of the Death of the Portrait” MUTE, no. 29 (Review).
Software Art After Programming” MUTE no.28.
Waking Up from Cinema” Vertigo, Vol 2 no. 4.
Programming with a Paintbrush: The Last Interactive Workstation” Filmwaves, no 12.
“Uncomfortable Choices” MUTE, no 18, (Review).
Artists as Workers and Technology as Artists” Variant, no 11, (Review).
Preserving Cultural Cinema while the World Moves On…” Filmwaves, no 10 (Review)
“The Matrix Rules” F I L M - P H I L O S O P H Y Internet Salon, Vol. 4, No. 3 (Review).
“Making the Right Connections” MUTE, no 15 (Review of Imaginaria, ICA).
"New Media, Old Technology" Variant, vol 2, no 6 and Readme! Filtered by Nettime, Ed. by Bosma et al, Autonomedia.
“Machine Therapeutics” Crash Media, no 3.
"Montage - Allegory - Transformation: A Study of Digital Imaging in Dialectical Film Making" Unpublished PhD thesis.
"Visual Technology and the Poetics of Knowledge" in Computers and Art, (ed.) by Stuart Mealing, Intellect.
"More Power: The Pioneers of British Computer Animation and their Legacy" in Diverse Practices: A Critical Reader on British Video Art (ed.) by Julia Knight, Arts Council of England and University of Luton.
"Art and Science in Chaos : Contesting Readings of Scientific Visualisation" in Futurenatural, (ed.) by Robertson, Mash et al. Routledge.
"Towards a Poetics of Knowledge" In Digital Salon, (ed.) by Tim Binkley and Antoinette LaFarge, catalogue published in Leonardo, Vol 28, No. 5.
"Technology is the Peoples Friend. Computers, Class and the New Cultural Politics" in Critical Issues in Electronic Media, (ed.) by Simon Penny, SUNY.
"Its Just Like Art : Notes on Computers, Class and Cultural Positioning" in Millenium Film Journal, 28.
"Tales of Pageant and Pantomime : A Technological Narrative for a Virtual Aristocracy" in Unnatural (ed.) Mathew Fuller, Underground.
"Soft Future" in 'VIdeo Positive '93' exhibition catalogue (Variant no 14), Liverpool. And in 'Machine Culture : The Virtual Frontier' (ed.) Simon Penny, in Visual Proceedings, ACM SIGGRAPH '93, U.S.A.
"SIGGRAPH : The Bigger Picture" Mediamatic Vol 7, no. 2 (Review).
"Superanimism" Art and Computer, SIGGRAPH '91 Art Show Catalogue, Las Vegas, U.S.A.
"Freedom and Interaction in New Media". For 'Interactions' exhibition catalogue. Rijks Museum, Enschede, Holland.
"Videognosis : Science as Voyeurism". Mediamatic Vol 5, no. 3.
"Computer Graphics as Allegorical Knowledge - Electronic Imagery in the Sciences" in 'Digital Image, Digital Cinema', SIGGRAPH '90 Art Show catalogue, Dallas,U.S.A
"Videographics and Allegorical Knowledge - The Epistemology of Leonardo" in Mediamatic Vol 3, no 4 (Review).
"The Image in Art and 'Computer Art'" Computer Art in Context, SIGGRAPH '89 Art Show Catalogue, Boston USA.
"Some Issues in the Development of Computer Art as a Mathematical Art Form" in Proceedings of First International Symposium on Electronic Art (ISEA), supplemental issue of Leonardo, Utrecht, Holland.