Is digital sculpture....sculpture ?

[evaldart]

I'm sure the computer crowd finds all the pecking and clicking plenty fun, and plenty challenging. And I'm sure the screen is thrilling them just fine with the growing of their visions. People get "into" all kinds of things. But I'm certain that this "feels" nothing like making sculpture to the do-er. All the things that we love about interacting with matter, and occasionally "winning" a struggle with some stuff...and by the achieving of the absolute validation of our independence as a being, by finally relevencing an act (as opposed to merely "performing" an act)... those things will not be experienced by the computer designer.

Someone said "the history of the human race has been a quest to make life easier". I'll buy that. But the "easing away" of life is a travesty to the individual. Its a sad tale of masses of concsioussness not getting their due, not becoming anything more than a participant; a "culture". Now I'm damned glad I can swipe my card at Mcdonalds and get my order in 36 seconds as opposed to the mind-numbing 98 seconds that it used to take (see, life got easier), but dont push that logic into fine Art.

All the worthwhile things have come from unusual efforts, assumed against the grain of human tendency. Purposely and puposefully difficult. Unbeknownst to most people, sculpture, as the few of us enlightened ones experience it, is the supreme application of an awareness. Other stuff is okay, and there will always be something new to toy with, but the sculptors are reaping - by the authenticity of their brand of labor - all the best that there is to get.
It would seem that makes us here potentially very fortunate.

[GaryR52]

Originally Posted by evaldart

Now I'm damned glad I can swipe my card at Mcdonalds and get my order in 36 seconds as opposed to the mind-numbing 98 seconds that it used to take (see, life got easier), but dont push that logic into fine Art.

Right. It is the struggle against the nature of the material, to create form out of the raw and formless that gives art its value. This is why, to the vast majority of people, it is the difficulty of doing so that makes it art and that makes the few who can do it well artists. Most people understand this, at least on an intuitive level. People value things that require effort and craftsmanship. If art is reduced to pushing buttons on a computer keyboard, it loses this fundamental quality.

Gary

[I.Chonov]

Originally Posted by GaryR52

People value things that require effort and craftsmanship. If art is reduced to pushing buttons on a computer keyboard, it loses this fundamental quality.

Gary

...be carefull there, mate- if effort and craftsmanship have importance as fundamental qualityes of Art, that could put 85% of Art created in the 20th century in a very ,er.....awkward position

Ivan

[grommet]

Originally Posted by GaryR52

Right. It is the struggle against the nature of the material, to create form out of the raw and formless that gives art its value. This is why, to the vast majority of people, it is the difficulty of doing so that makes it art and that makes the few who can do it well artists. Most people understand this, at least on an intuitive level. People value things that require effort and craftsmanship. If art is reduced to pushing buttons on a computer keyboard, it loses this fundamental quality.

Gary

I disagree only because that is only one starting point ( as has been said).
People get bored with just pushing buttons, so they invent other things that seem hard at first & then they invent more ways to make it easier.
Some justify doing things in archaic ways because it is the fall-back manual hard thing to do. Other people invent new & creative mental problems for constructing their technology asissted art. They just go to the gym they can afford to expend their extra energy. They have a soy latte while they're there too.
If digital sculpture doesn't have the same life as that done by manual means, it's probably on someone's to do list... just another problem to solve.

[evaldart]

Right G, they'll come up with a "soul" program or a "manually minipulated" program or "click here to engage unexpected , yet desireable, flaws" program.

And, everything you might do at the gym is exactly the things you SHOULD be doing to make sculpture...besides, sculpture is way better than a personal trainer - the trainer is gonna try to make you eat VEGETABLES!

[GaryR52]

Originally Posted by I.Chonov

...be carefull there, mate- if effort and craftsmanship have importance as fundamental qualityes of Art, that could put 85% of Art created in the 20th century in a very ,er.....awkward position

Ivan

LOL. Yep, and I may be back peddling a bit on that, myself, since I'm an abstractionist.
But, you know, that's what the "realists" always tell me, though. Never thought I'd find myself agreeing with them.

Gary

[GaryR52]

Originally Posted by evaldart

Right G, they'll come up with a "soul" program or a "manually minipulated" program or "click here to engage unexpected , yet desireable, flaws" program.

Yeah, there will be sliders labeled "expressiveness" and "originality," with "Less" and "More" at either end.

Gary

[grommet]

Originally Posted by evaldart

Right G, they'll come up with a "soul" program or a "manually minipulated" program or "click here to engage unexpected , yet desireable, flaws" program.

And, everything you might do at the gym is exactly the things you SHOULD be doing to make sculpture...besides, sculpture is way better than a personal trainer - the trainer is gonna try to make you eat VEGETABLES!

Yup, and eat your veggies, your colon will thank you.

[Giotto]

Originally Posted by evaldart

Right G, they'll come up with a "soul" program or a "manually minipulated" program or "click here to engage unexpected , yet desireable, flaws" program.

This bring up an interesting point. What kind of freedom do you have as an artist if your given a series of choices by someone else...the programmer in this case. There is also the limitation of the hardware (keyboard, mouse, digital pad etc) . So over the long term, instead of computers freeing the artist it may have just the opposite effect.

G

[cheesepaws]

Originally Posted by Giotto

This bring up an interesting point. What kind of freedom do you have as an artist if your given a series of choices by someone else...the programmer in this case. There is also the limitation of the hardware (keyboard, mouse, digital pad etc) . So over the long term, instead of computers freeing the artist it may have just the opposite effect.

G

I don't know - I've never lose any sleep over my angle grinder not being too useful at hammering in nails. YOU pick the right tool for the right job - it need not be any different when using digital modeling programs.

[rusticrick]

Originally Posted by Giotto

I Found a few of the St. George submissions were generated digitally. To me posed the question "If something is created through scanning and composed on a 2D computer screen...then printed out (3D) with no hands on manipulation...is it really sculpture ?" Is the person creating it a sculptor ? or should this form a new category ? i.e. computer generated art.

I wonder about this. A friend of mine spend months sculpting several figures for a contest she won. She took the maquettes to a enlargement facility and the owner suggested next time she just bring in the models. Have them stand in pose until the scanning is done and he would do the rest.

I would like to hear your comments.....

G

computers digital imaging are just another tool new tool use it to express yourself. the chisel was a new tool when it was invented

[Ries]

While I am a big believer in hand craftsmanship, and, I would guess, I own more hand tools and manually run power and machine tools than most anybody here, I dont buy the argument that somehow using a computer takes out the soul, or the human element.


If the computer did all the work, then every single computer assisted artwork would look pretty much the same.

But they dont- a CNC tool has a whole LOT of personality of its own, and mastering that, and forcing it to do what YOU want it to do, is no easier or more predictable, than mastering a cutting torch or an air chisel.
In each case, the artist has to make multiple decisions that affect the way the final piece comes out.

Its the decisions that the brain makes, not the actual work of the hands, that makes EVERY piece of art.
If all you had to do was pound on something, gorillas would be making better sculptures than they do now.

Anyway, if you have ever actually used a CNC machine, you realize that Evald's prized "unexpected , yet desireable, flaws" are all to common.

Any CNC machine has a personality, quirks, and yes, flaws, that must be massaged, worked around, and generally persuaded to work with you, rather than against you. They are tools, just like any other.

I dont do a lot of button pushing in my work- today, for example, I was forging hot stainless on the power hammer, twisting it hot, needle scaling sheet, running a milling machine, drilling, and bending stuff with the hossfeld and the brake.
But as soon as I can afford one, I will be buying a CNC milling machine, and I know it wont make things any easier- instead, it will give me whole volumes of new problems to work out. Nope, I wont be chiseling by hand- but if you think you just push one button, and the machine does all the rest- well, I have several bridges to sell you.

I currently do some work on a CNC embroidery machine- and, again, it is a totally artistic process. I hand draw images- on paper, or on a computer, sometimes both. Then I redraw and realign every point on the curves and lines, point by point- no bitmap to vector program I ever saw actually works very well without artistic massaging. Then, I run the stuff on the sewing machine- and every fabric, type of thread, size and shape runs differently. Unintended flaws are my middle name.

In mass production, maybe after the 10,000 part, you can get button pushing uniformity- but as an artist using CNC equipment, I can tell you that no two artists will get the same result with the same machine.

Besides, my knees and elbows are giving out as I close in on 60, and I aint no gorilla.

[GaryR52]

Originally Posted by Giotto

This bring up an interesting point. What kind of freedom do you have as an artist if your given a series of choices by someone else...the programmer in this case. There is also the limitation of the hardware (keyboard, mouse, digital pad etc) . So over the long term, instead of computers freeing the artist it may have just the opposite effect.

G

That's been my chief complaint. The best pieces I've done digitally - and none of them really matched my creative vision - were done in 3DS MAX, using the preset primitives as my starting point. So, I was confined to a narrow range of basic forms to work with, for one thing. The torus and, especially, the torus knot are my favorites, as they can yield a range of organic forms. Even so, working with only those two primitives, you're then confined further, still, by a narrow range of deformation tools to apply to them. And this is the program I've managed to get the most out of. Most modelers I've tried aren't even that "user-friendly." So, how creative can one be if confined by such narrow and restrictive parameters? Oh, I'm sure there are some whiz kids who know how to get more out of it than I can. No doubt. But, even they are still confined to what the software developers made the program capable of doing. See what I mean by doing sculpture with boxing gloves on?

Give me some clay and the only limitations on what I can do with it will be dictated by my own imagination, my skills and how much clay I have to work with.

Gary

[evaldart]

One day the tech slaves' advances in robotic surgury will allow for the head of a human being to be sewn onto the body of a gorilla. There will then arrive levels of true sculpture like the world has never seen. If I'm around, they can try it out on me.

[GlennT]

Originally Posted by evaldart

One day the tech slaves' advances in robotic surgury will allow for the head of a human being to be sewn onto the body of a gorilla. There will then arrive levels of true sculpture like the world has never seen. If I'm around, they can try it out on me.

Eh, What??!!!...that is your real head?

[evaldart]

No, Glenn, not even close. It has been estimated that a Silverback male gorilla could be upwards of 8 times stronger than your average human male. I, on the other hand, am only two or three times stronger.

[Ries]

Alas, unlike the superhuman Evald, I am more like Warren Zevon, in his song where the Gorilla steals the keys to his BMW, and leaves Warren in the zoo, while the Gorilla proceeds to live his life, sleep with his girlfriends, and generally live it up at Warren's expense.

http://warrenzevon.lyrics.info/goril...desperado.html

As Warren says- "I wish the ape a lot of success".

Here is a link to Warren singing it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2O91T6ZeW0

[KelEG]

I went into digital sculpture after many years doing traditional.

At the time it felt like trying to work with boxes on your hands-because you wanted to grab the piece but couldnt.
Then Zbrush came along-which allows a much more fluid approach.
But--I would not consider it the same as sculpting. You cant use your hands, you only use one, you move it over a flat surface(either a mouse or wacom tablet).
Digital sculpture is more of an illustrator friendly medium I think. It allows illustrators to sculpt without any of the hassles that traditional sculptors face(symmetry, smoothing etc). And they do it all with a pen(or mouse).

Though they are developing newer haptic technology that will allow one to wear a glove that can "feel" the sculpture as you manipulate it.

The most amazing thing I found about digital is that you can do symmetry without having to think about it. You have to deliberately add imperfections.

3D printing is interesting in that it promises to allow very complex forms without any thought to moldmaking issues--undercuts etc.
One example would be, you could have a character with an open mouth and a full set of teeth inside--you could sculpt the inside of the mouth and the tongue and have that transferred to a real object. Or at least that's the test I would put it through.

It has definitely changed the commercial sculpting world--I have heard about traditional sculptors doing toy sculpts who are being forced to learn digital because the industry is switching production methods. Its just easier for them to have the model made in computer.

But its definitely not the same as traditional sculpting. You can do highly detailed and expressive work, but there is something a bit cold about it. I learned digital originally so I could try for modeling jobs, but after getting into it I decided it was more interesting as a whole process--modeling through animation). As a job, I think sitting in front of a computer screen doesn't seem right. I would much rather be standing over a sculpting table if I have to do it for a living.

[GaryR52]

KelEG, I had exactly the same experience with most of the software I've tried, only I described it as trying to sculpt with boxing gloves on.

Also, the need for deliberate additions of imperfections is yet another reason why I've come to the point of preferring traditional sculpture tools and techniques, as opposed to virtual. That, plus the tactile sense that is missing from the experience when one goes digital.

Gary

[Ries]

Originally Posted by GaryR52

Also, the need for deliberate additions of imperfections is yet another reason why I've come to the point of preferring traditional sculpture tools and techniques, as opposed to virtual.
Gary

While I certainly work with computers in a variety of ways, I think your "deliberate imperfections" are key.

to quote the philosopher Hakim Bey-

they are "fortuitous mistranslations"

He has a whole theory about Cultural Drift- that is, unintended results. He likes it, and thinks it produces most of the interesting innovations and creative developments in the social and physical world of human beings.

Similarly, David Pye, who I think is a far superiour writer about aesthetics and their production than somebody like Clive Bell (although I liked ol' Clive in Children of Men) discusses this very point at length in his great book, The Nature and Art of Worksmanship.

http://www.woodcentral.com/books/pye.shtml

these basic principles apply to most anything that humans make by hand, regardless of whether or not you feel obliged to call them "art" or not.

He advances the proposition that there is an inherent feel to the seemingly random textures, the unconscious hand/eye patterns, and those imperfections, which humans prefer to the machine made.

I think some of this is similar to how an animal will find its mother in a huge herd, or flock of ten thousand penguins. We humans are mysteriously drawn to the work of other human hands, on an unconscious level, we sense the phermones or something.

So while I can appreciate the cold and beautiful perfection of the machine made, and make plenty myself with machines, I am also totally seduced by those manmade patterns and "mistakes" that result from human beings using their brains, eyes, and hands, to create something.

[GaryR52]

Originally Posted by Ries

While I certainly work with computers in a variety of ways, I think your "deliberate imperfections" are key.

to quote the philosopher Hakim Bey-

they are "fortuitous mistranslations"

He has a whole theory about Cultural Drift- that is, unintended results. He likes it, and thinks it produces most of the interesting innovations and creative developments in the social and physical world of human beings.

Similarly, David Pye, who I think is a far superiour writer about aesthetics and their production than somebody like Clive Bell (although I liked ol' Clive in Children of Men) discusses this very point at length in his great book, The Nature and Art of Worksmanship.

http://www.woodcentral.com/books/pye.shtml

these basic principles apply to most anything that humans make by hand, regardless of whether or not you feel obliged to call them "art" or not.

He advances the proposition that there is an inherent feel to the seemingly random textures, the unconscious hand/eye patterns, and those imperfections, which humans prefer to the machine made.

I think some of this is similar to how an animal will find its mother in a huge herd, or flock of ten thousand penguins. We humans are mysteriously drawn to the work of other human hands, on an unconscious level, we sense the phermones or something.

So while I can appreciate the cold and beautiful perfection of the machine made, and make plenty myself with machines, I am also totally seduced by those manmade patterns and "mistakes" that result from human beings using their brains, eyes, and hands, to create something.

I couldn't agree more. As one of my professors once said, the more things become "high-tech," the more humans yearn for the "high-touch." To an extent, the machine age has alienated man from the products of his own labor.

Gary

[Andrew Werby]

Ries wrote:

there is an inherent feel to the seemingly random textures, the unconscious hand/eye patterns, and those imperfections, which humans prefer to the machine made.

Gary wrote:

I couldn't agree more. As one of my professors once said, the more things become "high-tech," the more humans yearn for the "high-touch." To an extent, the machine age has alienated man from the products of his own labor.

[While it's certainly easier to produce sculpture with a coldly geometric aesthetic feeling when you use digital technology, it's also perfectly possible to introduce subtle semi-random patterns and yes, even "imperfections". I think you're reacting to a stereotype image you've built up in your mind, instead of realizing the possibilities that digital technology opens up for sculpture that goes beyond the limitations of the common concept of "machine-age" art. There's no inherent contradiction I can see between "high tech" and "high touch"; it just takes some pushing of the envelope to merge the two.]

Andrew Werby
www.computersculpture.com

[GaryR52]

Not at all, Andrew. As you know, as a member of my Digital Abstract Sculpture Group on Flickr, I've been involved in using digital means to produce sculpture since 2003. Furthermore, my own use of it has been chiefly aimed at producing, not "cold geometric" forms, but rather, organic forms, like those I exhibited at Intersculpt 2005.

No, I'm not in any way condemning digital sculpture or saying that it is in any way invalid as an art form. I'm simply saying that, personally, I find the technology rather limiting, and perhaps that's more a function of my own skill level with the software I've used, but it still always lacked the tactile sensation I get from making something with my own two hands. It is that difference that I'm talking about here, and yes, it is only a difference. It doesn't mean that one medium is "better" than the other.

Gary

[The Forge]

When a computer is able to create 'Art' on its own that will be the true definition of 'digital art'. Until then it is an 'Artist' using a computer to create his/her definition of Art. It is a tool that makes it easier to envision your concept in 3D as you rotate the image on the screen. But, in my opinion, it takes away the 'surprises' that sometimes make a piece 'Art' and sometimes, trash.

[KelEG]

I use digital to do animation models, but I do not like using it to make "art piece" statues.
It just seems weird to me.
Tried starting a few but didnt like it.
Plus I like to add and subtract and move things around instead of always working from a drawing, and its harder to do that in digital.

Although I am noticing that cg sculpting has made me try to make my real clay work smoother, cleaner and more detailed (since you can zoom in on a digital sculpture).