Your browser does not support the video tag.
Your browser does not support the video tag.
Marco Cadioli - The Whirlpool
  • © ARSHAKE | ISSN 2283-3676
  • CONTACT
  • Login
Arshake
  • ABOUT US
    • ABOUT US
    • PROJECT
    • MEDIA/PARTNERSHIPS
    • CONTACT US
  • FOCUS
    • All
    • Focus
    • From the Past
    • Interview
    Timeline Shift at Pastificio Cerere Foundation in Rome

    Cardiff & Miller at the Coimbra Biennial

    Pamela Diamante at the Gilda Lavia Gallery

    Pamela Diamante at the Gilda Lavia Gallery

    Arcangelo Sassolino at the Continua Gallery

    Arcangelo Sassolino at the Continua Gallery

    Experimental Fellowship at Bauhaus Earth

    Experimental Fellowship at Bauhaus Earth

    Open call – Schermo dell’Arte

    Open call – Schermo dell’Arte

    Open Call: State of the ART(ist)

    Open Call: State of the ART(ist)

    Interview | Liu Jiayu

    Interview | Liu Jiayu

    Theatre of Proof at PAV

    Theatre of Proof at PAV

    Wetland Role-Playing Game

    Wetland Role-Playing Game

  • FRAME
    FRAME > Stop, Listen, Look

    FRAME > Stop, Listen, Look

    FRAME > Shining Hat

    FRAME > Shining Hat

    FRAME > To Breathe

    FRAME > To Breathe

    FRAME >  The fairies will find us if we leave a trail

    FRAME > The fairies will find us if we leave a trail

    FRAME > Hundred Changes in Life

    FRAME > Hundred Changes in Life

    FRAME >  Large Resemblagé

    FRAME > Large Resemblagé

    FRAME > Rubber Pencil Devil

    FRAME > Rubber Pencil Devil

    FRAME > ARC 2000

    FRAME > ARC 2000

    FRAME > Seeders and Leechers

    FRAME > Seeders and Leechers

  • VIDEO POST
    VIDEO POST > Augmented Shadow: Inside

    VIDEO POST > Augmented Shadow: Inside

    VIDEO POST > Anthofluid

    VIDEO POST > Anthofluid

    VIDEO POST > Isoscope

    VIDEO POST > Isoscope

    VIDEO POST > Kihikihi

    VIDEO POST > Kihikihi

    VIDEO POST > Triosophia

    VIDEO POST > Triosophia

    VIDEO POST > Kosei Komatsu

    VIDEO POST > Kosei Komatsu

    VIDEO POST > STRATACUT

    VIDEO POST > STRATACUT

    VIDEO POST > File Tabs no. 1

    VIDEO POST > File Tabs no. 1

    VIDEO POST > The Recap

    VIDEO POST > The Recap

  • SPECIAL PROJECT
    • ARSHAKE’S BANNER
    • CRITICAL GROUNDS
    • YOUNG ITALIAN ARTISTS
    • GAME OVER
    • GAME OVER • Loading
    • EXTERNAL PROJECTS
      • BACKSTAGE | ONSTAGE
      • PERCORSI • 6 years of the Terna Prize
      • TEMPO IMPERFETTO
  • RESOURCES
    • ARCHIVE
    • CALLS
    • ONLINE RESOUCES
  • it IT
  • en English
No Result
View All Result
Arshake
  • ABOUT US
    • ABOUT US
    • PROJECT
    • MEDIA/PARTNERSHIPS
    • CONTACT US
  • FOCUS
    • All
    • Focus
    • From the Past
    • Interview
    Timeline Shift at Pastificio Cerere Foundation in Rome

    Cardiff & Miller at the Coimbra Biennial

    Pamela Diamante at the Gilda Lavia Gallery

    Pamela Diamante at the Gilda Lavia Gallery

    Arcangelo Sassolino at the Continua Gallery

    Arcangelo Sassolino at the Continua Gallery

    Experimental Fellowship at Bauhaus Earth

    Experimental Fellowship at Bauhaus Earth

    Open call – Schermo dell’Arte

    Open call – Schermo dell’Arte

    Open Call: State of the ART(ist)

    Open Call: State of the ART(ist)

    Interview | Liu Jiayu

    Interview | Liu Jiayu

    Theatre of Proof at PAV

    Theatre of Proof at PAV

    Wetland Role-Playing Game

    Wetland Role-Playing Game

  • FRAME
    FRAME > Stop, Listen, Look

    FRAME > Stop, Listen, Look

    FRAME > Shining Hat

    FRAME > Shining Hat

    FRAME > To Breathe

    FRAME > To Breathe

    FRAME >  The fairies will find us if we leave a trail

    FRAME > The fairies will find us if we leave a trail

    FRAME > Hundred Changes in Life

    FRAME > Hundred Changes in Life

    FRAME >  Large Resemblagé

    FRAME > Large Resemblagé

    FRAME > Rubber Pencil Devil

    FRAME > Rubber Pencil Devil

    FRAME > ARC 2000

    FRAME > ARC 2000

    FRAME > Seeders and Leechers

    FRAME > Seeders and Leechers

  • VIDEO POST
    VIDEO POST > Augmented Shadow: Inside

    VIDEO POST > Augmented Shadow: Inside

    VIDEO POST > Anthofluid

    VIDEO POST > Anthofluid

    VIDEO POST > Isoscope

    VIDEO POST > Isoscope

    VIDEO POST > Kihikihi

    VIDEO POST > Kihikihi

    VIDEO POST > Triosophia

    VIDEO POST > Triosophia

    VIDEO POST > Kosei Komatsu

    VIDEO POST > Kosei Komatsu

    VIDEO POST > STRATACUT

    VIDEO POST > STRATACUT

    VIDEO POST > File Tabs no. 1

    VIDEO POST > File Tabs no. 1

    VIDEO POST > The Recap

    VIDEO POST > The Recap

  • SPECIAL PROJECT
    • ARSHAKE’S BANNER
    • CRITICAL GROUNDS
    • YOUNG ITALIAN ARTISTS
    • GAME OVER
    • GAME OVER • Loading
    • EXTERNAL PROJECTS
      • BACKSTAGE | ONSTAGE
      • PERCORSI • 6 years of the Terna Prize
      • TEMPO IMPERFETTO
  • RESOURCES
    • ARCHIVE
    • CALLS
    • ONLINE RESOUCES
No Result
View All Result
Arshake
No Result
View All Result
Home News Interview

William Latham | Interview by Eva kekou

Eva Kekou by Eva Kekou
23/01/2014
in Interview

William_Latham_01s

Arshake is pleased to re-launch an interview by Eva Kekou to William Latham, English computer artist, reknown worldwide, among other things, to be the founder of Organic Art. By recalling his experience between research and industry, going back to his early artistic residency at IBM in the Eighties, Latham offers multiple hints of reflection and places in time the most recent experimentations. The interview appeared on 4 Humanities in February 2013, some times before the opening of the Phoenix Brighton Festival to which one of Latham’s answers refers to. Within the Festival it was featured a symposium dedicated to Latham’s work followed by the exhibition MUTATOR 1+2 , realized in collaboration with  Sue Golllifer.

Eva Kekou: Hello William! What made you move into the world of computing?

William Latham: It was largely due to having done work in a geometric Russian Constructivist Style, and to producing hand drawn animated films using 3-point perspective when I was 19 – 20 years of age. The sheer labour of producing these films at 25 hand drawn images per sec was a factor in seeking a tool that could help. Initially I did this using Fortran 77 at the Computing Department at Oxford University. One thing that I did learn early on was what a computer can do, and what it cannot. The cannots have changed little since 1982 from my POV.

EK: What was it like being artist in residence at IBM in the 80s?

WL: It was a very exciting period. At that time, machines were slow, you really had to be working in a corporate environment on mainframe computers to be able to do anything interesting. At that time, IBM, which was hugely successful, was backing a lot of innovative research, they were backing Mandelbrot, Alan Norton, Richard Voss, and I felt part of that community. In parallel, Karl Sims was at Thinking Machines and Yoichiro Kawaguchi had commercial backing in Japan, so was an exciting time with artists / science being backed by corporations and that innovation feeding into tech development. In addition, they were paying me a very good salary to be an artist and sponsoring all my touring exhibitions in the UK, Germany, Japan and Australia, so was an excellent time for me as an artist. On a more minor note, one of the things I really liked in 87 / 88 was that email was quite rare and by being at IBM one had internal email to IBM.

l_flower

EK: You collaborate with mathematician Stephen Todd – can you describe how that works in practice?

WL: I have collaborated with Stephen for a long time (and now also his son Peter), since 1987, with a gap of around 12 years when I was sucked into the world of developing computer games. The dynamic was first set by Stephen seeing my FormSynth evolutionary drawings, which mapped out an evolutionary system for evolving complex forms. He said, “We should turn this into software.” What emerged was a Mathematician / Artist dynamic, both being very creative, with me as the artist coming up with “big / imaginative vision and having an eye for publicity.”

EK: Can you explain about the algorithms you use in developing your work?

WL: That is quite a big topic! Most of the core algorithms / logic we use today are described in the book Evolutionary Art and Computers that Stephen and I wrote many years ago. There is also a good Evomusart paper we wrote a couple of years ago on the cross-over Bioinformatics work with Imperial College.

[youtube id=”AN6ngsckRZs” width=”620″ height=”360″]

EK: You have also been involved in the computer games industry; how did that affect your artwork and vice versa?

WL: I would say the one thing I have learned is organisational skills and how to build software teams to build products and negotiate big contracts. I am now just starting to use these skills again in art and the Phoenix Show backed by The Arts Council England was one my first forays using those skills in art, hopefully be employed many more times.

I think the big thing I learnt from my work in Games, is the difference between Art and Entertainment, is that you cannot do both at the same time. The nice thing about being in the Entertainment industry is that there is a clear measure if something is successful, something sells or it does not, and everything that one does working on a product is to maximise that value. In Art it is more subtle and vague / mysterious and down to critical currents and fashion, which is at times frustrating.

EK: I know you returned to academia after thirteen years. What is the input you can bring in to academia as an artist and from your previous experience?

WL: I would say I have a broad spectrum of experience from hard core commercial through to pure art. I would say I have learned that mixing artists into teams of programmers and mathematicians in a research context produces extremely interesting results and can be a catalyst for real innovation, but then this needs to be rapidly prototyped to be captured.

Black-Crystal-Etching-detail.-FormSynth.-William-Latham-1985

EK: Give us some information about Phoenix Brighton festival.
What are the aims of the festival?

WL: The aims of my show at the Phoenix is to show a full spectrum of work and collaborators: from my early perspective drawings used to make animated films, to my hand-drawn FormSynth drawings done at the RCA, to my IBM work from 87 – 93, then jumping to 2007 when I was at Goldsmiths as a Professor, showing our crossover work with Imperial College in Bioinformatics and other science / art work, to a much more recent large-scale piece, Mutator2 Triptych that fills an entire room, developed over the past year. My priority is to show the history of the work. in addition I have done a large hand-drawn image directly on the gallery wall, which serves as an entry point to the exhibition (Great to be drawing again!)

This interview originally appeared on 4Humanities on 12.02.2013 and it is here re-published under kind permission of its author

Images

(1 cover) William Latham- Mutation Raytracm, 1992 (2) Goldsmiths- Digital Studios,2007 (3)William Latham, Flower (4) William Latham – Black Crystal Etching (detail). FormSynth, 1985

ShareTweetShareSend
Previous Post

Eduardo Kac. Language and Life

Next Post

PostPicture – Bitforms

Eva Kekou

Eva Kekou

Related Posts

Interview | Liu Jiayu
Focus

Interview | Liu Jiayu

by Veronica Di Geronimo
30/04/2025
Interview | Mario Cristiani
Focus

Interview | Mario Cristiani

by Veronica Di Geronimo
11/03/2025

CALLS

Experimental Fellowship at Bauhaus Earth
Calls

Experimental Fellowship at Bauhaus Earth

14/05/2025
Open call – Schermo dell’Arte
Calls

Open call – Schermo dell’Arte

07/05/2025
Open Call: State of the ART(ist)
Calls

Open Call: State of the ART(ist)

05/05/2025
RE:HUMANISM Art Prize 4
Calls

RE:HUMANISM Art Prize 4

18/03/2025
https://www.arshake.com/special-project-banner/young-italian-artists/
Facebook Twitter Instagram

Arshake is a collaborative artistic project, blurring the borders between art, science and technology, information and production.

  • Focus
  • Video post
  • Frame
  • Special Project
  • Interview
  • Calls
  • Exhibitions

One more step - Check your email and click the confirmation link

© 2024 – ARSHAKE

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In
Gestisci Consenso Cookie
Per fornire le migliori esperienze, utilizziamo tecnologie come i cookie per memorizzare e/o accedere alle informazioni del dispositivo. Il consenso a queste tecnologie ci permetterà di elaborare dati come il comportamento di navigazione o ID unici su questo sito. Non acconsentire o ritirare il consenso può influire negativamente su alcune caratteristiche e funzioni.
Funzionale Always active
L'archiviazione tecnica o l'accesso sono strettamente necessari al fine legittimo di consentire l'uso di un servizio specifico esplicitamente richiesto dall'abbonato o dall'utente, o al solo scopo di effettuare la trasmissione di una comunicazione su una rete di comunicazione elettronica.
Preferenze
L'archiviazione tecnica o l'accesso sono necessari per lo scopo legittimo di memorizzare le preferenze che non sono richieste dall'abbonato o dall'utente.
Statistiche
L'archiviazione tecnica o l'accesso che viene utilizzato esclusivamente per scopi statistici. L'archiviazione tecnica o l'accesso che viene utilizzato esclusivamente per scopi statistici anonimi. Senza un mandato di comparizione, una conformità volontaria da parte del vostro Fornitore di Servizi Internet, o ulteriori registrazioni da parte di terzi, le informazioni memorizzate o recuperate per questo scopo da sole non possono di solito essere utilizzate per l'identificazione.
Marketing
L'archiviazione tecnica o l'accesso sono necessari per creare profili di utenti per inviare pubblicità, o per tracciare l'utente su un sito web o su diversi siti web per scopi di marketing simili.
Manage options Manage services Manage {vendor_count} vendors Read more about these purposes
Visualizza le preferenze
{title} {title} {title}
No Result
View All Result
  • ABOUT US
    • ABOUT US
    • PROJECT
    • MEDIA/PARTNERSHIPS
    • CONTACT US
  • FOCUS
  • FRAME
  • VIDEO POST
  • SPECIAL PROJECT
    • ARSHAKE’S BANNER
    • CRITICAL GROUNDS
    • YOUNG ITALIAN ARTISTS
    • GAME OVER
    • GAME OVER • Loading
    • EXTERNAL PROJECTS
      • BACKSTAGE | ONSTAGE
      • PERCORSI • 6 years of the Terna Prize
      • TEMPO IMPERFETTO
  • RESOURCES
    • ARCHIVE
    • CALLS
    • ONLINE RESOUCES

© 2024 – ARSHAKE

This website uses cookies. By continuing to use this website you are giving consent to cookies being used. Visit our Privacy and Cookie Policy.