11.
Frederik Vanhoutte (BE)
+0-0 (add nothing, subtract nothing)
2021
Generative pen plotter drawings on paper
The work +0-0 (add nothing, subtract nothing) starts from a simple shape, and does two simple things:
- cut the shape in half,
- and either rotate half of the shape by 90° or move half of the shape.
A simple start, simple operations, yet what emerges after enough repetitions isn’t simple.
Complexity is created without adding or removing anything.
A sequence of operations like this, with discrete steps, repetitions, and conditional choices is called an algorithm, from the name of the 9th-century mathematician al-Khwārizmī.
Similar to a recipe to be followed, the concept of an algorithm is a fundament in computer science today.
The algorithm does not “see” or “know” the shape. It cannot lift the shape, push it or turn it around like we would with a set of blocks.
Eyeless, handless, to make it work, shapes have to be represented in a language it understands.
Mathematics provides us with that language.
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