PG: ”Hacking is getting a lot cooler now. But I think it is probably better for picking people up at parties if you can say you’re a painter.”
At a party, I say I used to be a painter, but gave it up because I can paint utter shit and still get recognition for it. When you code utter shit, nothing matters unless that shit works.
Most people don't understand either profession. Nowadays I just say - "I'm still a practising artist, but I only practise the black arts." Then I try and explain recursion to them.
"Nothing matters unless that shit works" applies to painting as well - the paint still has to stick to the canvas. And plenty of coded "utter shit" gets heaps of recognition - like every middleman-creating user-disempowering "web 2.0" data silo.
> "Nothing matters unless that shit works" applies to painting as well - the paint still has to stick to the canvas.
Any artist with half a brain cell can get round that conundrum, just sell the collector an empty canvas and then sell them a bullshit story that it is art.
> And plenty of coded "utter shit" gets heaps of recognition - like every middleman-creating user-disempowering "web 2.0" data silo.
Wait up, are you suggesting that every middleman-creating user-disempowering "web 2.0" data silo works well and has few known bugs?
> Any artist with half a brain cell can get round that conundrum, just sell the collector an empty canvas and then sell them a bullshit story that it is art.
Lucio Fontana is nothing comparing to Piero Manzoni.
He get through making an artwork featuring 90 tin can filled with 30g of his own shit. Please read the label that said Merda d'artista (artist shit) :
Artist's Shit
Contents 30 gr net
Freshly preserved
Produced and tinned
in May 1961
Quoting Wikipedia : The cans were originally to be valued according to their equivalent weight in gold — $37 each in 1961 — with the price fluctuating according to the market.
But the stuff is today shown in biggest museum, and one can has been sold $160300 in 2008.
Well sure, but in that case hasn't the medium shifted to the meta, and what has to work is the explanation itself?
And certainly not. What I'm saying is that a piece of software functioning correctly does not preclude it from being "utter shit". And quite a lot of "utter shit" software (based on its foundations and purpose) is currently getting loads of recognition from VC money looking to become middlemen 2.0.
> Well sure, but in that case hasn't the medium shifted to the meta, and what has to work is the explanation itself?
Who cares, the artist is getting off on the fact he just sold a blank canvas. That's the real meta (or mark), the art of the con (this is where the black arts have infiltrated the traditional arts).
> What I'm saying is that a piece of software functioning correctly does not preclude it from being "utter shit".
OK, so software that functions correctly can still be "utter shit", yeah I can roll with that. On many levels modern art is considered not to have a function, it is art for its own sake. This "utter shit" software that we are talking about still does something (useful I presume), whereas a blank canvas just takes up space.
> I just say what the dictionary entry is for recursion: see recursion.
Paraphrasing Simon Cozens, that joke is so old it is growing hairs. Explaining recursion will not make you cooler, unless you say beforehand that you used to be a painter but gave it up because you can paint vile shit and still get a load of recognition for it. That will make you seem much edgier and anti-establishment or whatever than the conceptual-artist/trendy-douchebag on the other side of the room.
At a party, I say I used to be a painter, but gave it up because I can paint utter shit and still get recognition for it. When you code utter shit, nothing matters unless that shit works.
Most people don't understand either profession. Nowadays I just say - "I'm still a practising artist, but I only practise the black arts." Then I try and explain recursion to them.