Spectral and Procedural Creativity: A Perspective from Computational Art

Abstract

This paper questions how computational art can be interpreted as creative by humans and the theoretical implications this may have. It explores how the affordances of computational art lead to radically new aesthetic experiences. The computational is manifested sensuously but it is nevertheless non-perceptual as although it requires a physical substrate, it is nevertheless not located there. It exists within, between and beyond its material instantiations as tangible objects and the process of that articulation. The computational is deterministic, which may appear to counter any potential for creativity, but it is often also irreducible, and as such its outcomes are impossible to anticipate. This paper undertakes an analysis of computational arts as spectral phenomena, ghostly in the sense that they are non-localisable, irreducible, situated between an algorithmic past and a futural becoming. Through this lens, computational arts offer glimpses into the possibility – and aesthetic potential – of autonomously creative systems.