Generative Art Conference 2014

I've been invited to present at the Generative Art Conference in Rome, December 16-19, 2014. Here is the abstract of the paper.

GA2014 – XVII Generative Art Conference
Marc Mancuso	Mind Over Matter: Generative Concepts in Three Dimensional Sculpture (Paper, Artworks)
Topic: (Paper, Artworks)   Authors: Marc Mancuso   www.flickr.com/photos/marcmancuso   Contact: marc_mancuso@ hotmail.com	This paper discusses the effect of generative concepts on the planning, execution, documentation, and interpretation of my recent series of three-dimensional sculptures. My intent was to build systems that had both cyclic and open-ended processes from which there is no combination of fundamental design or surface evidence that traditionally identifies an objectas precursor or final product.   Metal, plaster, rubber, clay, and other commonplace sculptural materials are categorized as points on a set of continuums including rigid-flexible, absorbent-waterproof, opaque-transparent, buoyant-dense, and so on. Based on these intrinsic qualities, I build systems that manage constraints and define and implement rule-sets to regulate the order of interactions. Despite the limited use of virtual technologies, the results of these physical activities can be compared to computational and iterative processes including Boolean operations, graphical user interface tools such as fill and skew, programming structures such as loops, random number generators, and geometric identities.   Additionally, my intent was to allow any transformation to initiate or concludeanother process. Observable “links” to preceding or successive iterations may be perceptible, but traditional notions of completeness or progress towards a particular state are discarded. The physical constraints in these systems inform a discussion of successes and failures encountered during the buildingof processes that respond to these these requirements.   Of particular interest is the way in which plaster, metal, clay, and rubber are used over a series of transformations that demonstrate recursive structures, variations in high- and low-fidelity data compression, and distortion.       (1) flexible form generates unique design from sequence of metal strips  (2) liquid plaster fills all spaces for separable, closely-interlocking pieces (3) liquid clay copies one of many possible spaces among plaster pieces (4) drained, separated clay shell ready for baking, shrinking, and reusing   Documenting ongoing systems that have one or more real-time unfolding aspects and one or more physically durable artifacts raises philosophical issues as well as practical ones. The paper examines the implications of documentation through still images and time-dependent mediums.   The paper concludes with a brief discussion of how the classification systems and transformational rules could inform future work.
	Keywords: sculpture, iteration, algorithm, recursion, materials science, plaster, casting