Meaningful nonsense | Generative art diary

My system for generating sentences, plus more from the plotter.

I write about generative art, code, creativity and other interconnected topics. You can expect a diary every Friday sharing what I’ve been working on, some things I’ve found interesting, and a link to a new article every other week (including this week!) Thanks for joining me here. 💖

Hello!

Artmaking often involves a balance between the things you “should” be doing and the things you’re drawn to doing. I’ve continued to be very taken with the plotter this week and I did not make much progress on my diagrams. The diagram code has a level of complexity where coming back to it after a break means refamiliarizing myself is a bit of a hurdle - even though I have done my best to keep it well documented and modular. It is tempting to put it off, especially when the handwriting and plotter work is rolling along.

There is, of course, value in allowing the things that feel right to develop, and I am very much enjoying the things I am creating. Like I say, a balance.

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New Article: Meaningful Nonsense

This article is about my system for generating sentences in JavaScript. I share the structures, word lists and rules that make it work, and talk a bit about what it might mean.

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New plotter drawings available in my shop!

I’ve made a small selection of plotter artworks available in the shop. More will be coming at random intervals.

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Things I worked on this week

Of course, the plotter outputs. They are mainly coming in two mediums.

Firstly, watercolours:

And secondly, pens:

I really like the effect of the white ink on grey paper but some of the lines are not coming out smooth, even after a few passes. I’m still experimenting with pens, weights and speeds, to get the best results and white pens are notoriously finicky.

I’ve also starting introducing other elements.

Love this one but there’s a replot in the plotter as we speak, as some kind of shift happened between the multiple passes and there is a bit of ghosting at the bottom.

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Lastly, I’ve also been developing a piece for an entry to a competition but whether or not I will finish it before the deadline this evening remains to be seen. It’s my weekly visit to my mum in her care home today, so it depends a lot on how that goes. Balance, again, is difficult.

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Things I’ve enjoyed this week

🎶 Featuring a sick trance gate and an excellent sample of a woman talking about raving, I can’t stop listening to Swimming Paul - Vhs.

🔥 This jaw dropping Zach Leiberman print.

🤖 I’m listening to the audiobook of God, Human, Animal, Machine which is partly a personal memoir of the author’s relationship with technology (particularly anthropomorphised technologies) and partly a collection of essays. It’s difficult to sum up, actually, but a very enjoyable and thought provoking listen.

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Plans for the upcoming week

🖋️ Continue to get handwriting working inside my generative diagrams, including figuring out curved words ← fully failed at this this week so I’m pushing it forward.

🎨 Create more plots and make them available in my shop.

📜 Start writing my next article, which I have a couple of ideas for.

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That’s it! Thanks again for joining me here!

If you only check out one thing from this newsletter, make it my article about meaningful nonsense.

I’ll leave you with a watercolour close up and I’ll see you here next Friday.

- Amy ⭐