In this text, I propose a metaphorical and literal comparison between how data is structured and managed in computer science and the human self, particularly in the context of the artist and their practice.
The Self as a Data Structure:
1. Data Structures and Their Functions:
- Definition: In computer science, a data structure is a specific way of organizing and storing data to enable efficient access and modification.
- Types: Common data structures include arrays, linked lists, trees, graphs, and hash tables.
- Operations: Operations on data structures include insertion, deletion, traversal, searching, and sorting.
2. The Self as a Data Structure:
- Self-Organization: The individual, or the self, can be seen as a complex data structure that organizes personal experiences, memories, emotions, and knowledge.
- Data Values: These personal elements resemble data values within the structure.
- Relationships: The data structure shows the relationships between these elements—how experiences influence emotions and how memories shape knowledge.
- Operations: The self performs operations on this personal data, including reflecting, learning, decision-making, and emotional processing.
3. The Artist as a Specialized Data Structure:
- Unique Format: An artist can be viewed as a specialized "existential" data structure with unique attributes tailored to artistic production.
- Art Practice as Operations: Artistic creation, interpretation, and innovation are specialized operations performed on the artist’s internal data.
- Art as Data Values: The artworks produced are the data values, the outputs of these operations.
4. Artistic Practice and Data Management:
- Processing: Just as a data structure processes information to produce outputs, the artist processes their internal states, influences, and ideas to create art.
- Retrieval and Storage: Memory and inspiration retrieval are crucial for the artist, akin to how data structures retrieve stored data.
- Evolution: The self evolves, acquiring new experiences and reshaping the structure, similar to dynamic data structures that can grow and change.
Visual and Conceptual Representation:
1. Visual Metaphor:
- Graphical Representation: Use diagrams of data structures like trees or graphs to represent the self visually. Nodes represent experiences, emotions, and knowledge, while edges show relationships.
- The palimpsest method: Paintings that emphasize erasure and incorporation naturally convey a sense of history and the complexity of identity. A rich, textured surface that invites viewers to explore and discover hidden depths and multicultural stories from layered symbols, meanings, colors, maps, shapes, and figurative and abstract elements.
- Interactive Art: Create installations where viewers can interact with elements representing the artist’s data structure, manipulating nodes and edges to see different outputs.
2. Conceptual Layers:
- Layering Data and Emotion: Create multimedia works layering code-like structures with personal narratives, blending the logical with the emotional.
- Algorithmic Art: Use algorithms that mimic cognitive processes, generating art that evolves based on predefined rules and reflects the self’s dynamic nature.
- Non-human creation: This is the first time in history that a non-human entity will be given the keys to human language in a way indistinguishable from humans.
3. Narrative and Reflection:
- Autobiographical Elements: Integrate autobiographical elements as case studies of how the artist’s data structure has evolved.
- Collaborative Creation: Engage the audience in adding to the data structure, reflecting on how external influences reshape the artist’s self and practice.
- AI and Human Relationships: Can an AI agent, serving as a curator or fellow artist, engage in meaningful reflections on an artist's practice?
Practical Implementation:
1. Workshops and Performances:
- Data Structure Workshops: Conduct workshops where participants map their data structures, identifying critical data values and relationships.
- Live Coding Performances: Perform live coding sessions where the artist writes code that generates visual art, symbolizing real-time self-processing.
2. Exhibitions and Installations:
- Drawings, Paintings, and Installations: Develop multimedia installations where visitors can navigate the artist’s data structure, exploring biographical and collective paths and nodes.
- Digital Archives: Create digital archives where each piece of art is linked to the artist’s personal data points, forming an accessible data structure.
- AI Interviews (audio and texts).
Theoretical Implications:
1. Interdisciplinary Approach:
- Bridging Disciplines: This concept combines computer science, psychology, and art, offering new perspectives on identity and creativity.
- New Art Forms: It fosters the creation of new, technologically driven yet tangible, traditional, and deeply personal art forms.
2. Philosophical Exploration:
- Existential Data Structures: Explore philosophical questions about the nature of the self as a data structure. What does it mean to view our identities in this way?
- Techno-Humanism: Reflect on the implications of integrating computational thinking into our understanding of human existence and creativity.
By developing this concept, my intention is to invite a broader dialogue about the intersections of technology, identity, and creativity.
