Between chance and repetition: Lesson 5

Lesson 5. The Method of Chance

A. Jackson Mac Low and his "word clouds"

Going back to Tzara's poem, we recall that it is a set of instructions. And yet, it seems that there is something strange: it is a method that intends the production of Chance events. In other words, is Tzara's instruction poem really a method of composition? Can a method be structured by randomness? Isn't this a contradiction in terms?

To investigate this question further, we will take a look at Jackson Mac Low's typographical drawings which he called Drawing-Asymmetry at https://www.moma.org/explore/inside_out/2014/02/05/the-poetry-of-silence-jackson-mac-lows-drawing-asymmetry/.

Below is an excerpt concerning Mac Low's typographical drawings from the web page cited above (my emphases):

     "The direction of the letters making up the words and word chains was not predetermined and Mac Low admits that he allowed it to unfold through his own “spontaneous choice.” Accordingly, the formal quality of the drawings is at once chance-based and personal, turning found text into a visual representation using the mind as a mode of automatic, aesthetic translation. Mac Low dubbed the products of his practice “performance poems” and saw the realization of his poetry, primarily through sound, as a formative component of the work. It was through vocalization and performance that the silences of his poetry could give rise to ambient noises that would give the piece new form.

     Like Cage, Mac Low was drawn, in particular, towards the use of long silences that permitted the field of ambient noise to become integrated within the piece. The silences, which structure the poems, were intentional, and although they allowed for a greater degree of indeterminacy, they also reflected the artist’s intention to create an open structure for the work. Mac Low disagreed with Maciunas’s “anti-art”; he saw Cage and himself as demonstrating an “openness to the world” while appreciating the role of the artist in that world. Although the scribble-like aesthetic of the Drawing-Asymmetry series suggests a child-like lack of intention, Mac Low was serious about the chance operation he employed, believing that his process as an artist was important to the critical reading of his poetry."

B. Guide questions

1. Do you believe in Chance? Does Chance exist?

2. Can we intentionally produce Chance? Are our actions governed by Chance?

3. If all writing is a Cut-up according to Burroughs, does this mean that all writing has a built in element of Chance?

4. How can writing be both chance-based and personal?

5. What is an ''open structure?'' Can a structure be open and stay within its structural integrity?

6. By extension, can your mind or self-identity be open and remain the ''same'' and not become other than itself?

C. Word Clouds vs. Drawing Asymmetries

Word clouds were invented primarily for visualizing huge textual data for word frequency. The more frequent the words are the bigger they are. Words are also color coded or space oriented for various purposes.

Although there is a sense in saying that word clouds "liberate" words from their syntactic moorings, there is still a limit to the use of word clouds as a  method of textual visualization. You can read the pros and cons here: Robert Hein, "The pros and cons of word clouds as visualizations," https://www.visioncritical.com/pros-and-cons-word-clouds-visualizations/.

1. What are the advantages and disadvantages of the ''analog'' version of Mac Low's drawing asymmetries versus the ''digital'' version of doing futurist inspired ''words-in-freedom'' processing?

2. How does word cloud programming affect or influence the data output that we get from the input we make?

3. Word clouds are simply aids to data research. Robert Hein says that ''Like all research data, skilled interpretation is what provides the beautiful insight.'' Is the human brain still better at making and interpreting texts?

4. An artist and a researcher would have different priorities in word processing. What would they be and how does this impact the production of textual material?

5. Which approach you liked better, your analog Cut-up, your Permuted Text notebook, or your Word cloud output? Why? Is it possible to combine them as successive/all-ternating steps in the future?

6. Which part is Chance, and which part is repetition? Can Chance repeat itself?

7. Are YOU a product of Chance or by Repetition?

Submit you answers on a fresh sheet as an additional page to you Notebook collection.