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A Brief History of Drawing Machines
Introduction to Tracing the Line: The Art of Drawing Machines and Pen Plotters
2023
But Can It Draw?
What if we ask AI to draw? Drawing requires a progressive accumulation of marks; a drawing is never “instant.” The artist begins with a blank page and makes a first line. As lines are added, an image slowly appears. The hand moves the stylus to make a mark, the eye watches the line, and the artist assesses that line’s qualities and adjusts accordingly. This cycle happens countless times throughout the drawing process. A drawing is a labor of choices at every scale; evidence of this human labor saturates a final drawing. Can AI make creative choices as it draws? Can tactile feedback loops inform new avenues for AI art?
Published in the Leverhulme Centre for the Future of Intelligence Blog at the University of Cambridge.
2025
Processing Process
How can we examine architectural process drawings beyond the depiction of buildings? What do the marks on paper tell us about how architects see?
Published in the Drawing Matter Catalogue as part of a Visiting Scholar position at the Drawing Matter Trust, London.
2025
A DIY Camera Lucida
A camera lucida is a 19th-century optical drawing aid that helps you draw from real life. This tutorial, published in MAKE:Magazine’s Retro Tech issue shows you how to make your own with simple materials.
2024
The Stereoautograph
Before Google Maps and GPS, mapmaking was a laborious endeavor. Armed with precise cameras made to take stereoscopic photos and sophisticated drawing machines, cartographers sought innovative ways to expedite this process. This is the story of the first machine to directly generate maps from photographs, made over 100 years ago.
Published in Drawing Matter Journal, Vol. 2
2023
Pictus Interruptus and other Notes on the Selfie
Selfies. Good? Bad? Who can say. But here's 5000 words on the selfie, touching on various parallel threads: culture, technology, identity. Seeing how the selfie operates gives us a clue on how we see everything around us, including ourselves.
2014
Observations on the Virtual
A conversation between Or Ettlinger and Pablo Garcia about the definition of virtual space on the occasion of Pablo Garcia’s exhibition at Aksioma, “Adventures in Virtuality”. Both Ettlinger and Garcia are academics, the former teaches Virtual Architecture and Media Theory in Ljubljana, the latter Contemporary Practices at the Art Institute of Chicago; they both share an interest in sci-fi, classical arts and both studied Architecture. Is “digital” a synonym for virtual? Are simulations virtual realities? Is the mental space a virtual space? These are the main questions discussed in this conversation and the answers are not so obvious. Virtual spaces are as ancient as the human need for and pleasure in creating images of the world. They can be analogic, as the work of Garcia shows. Virtual is related with reproducibility and is not about the physicality or non-physicality of the object – it is about what we see through the object.
2015
New Art/Science Affinities
"New Art/Science Affinities," which focuses on artists working at the intersection of art, science and technology, was produced by a collaborative authoring process known as a "book sprint." Derived from "code sprinting," a method in which software developers gather in a single room to work intensely on an open source project for a certain period of time, the term book sprint describes the quick, collective writing of a topical book.
The book includes meditations, interviews, diagrams, letters and manifestos on maker culture, hacking, artist research, distributed creativity, and technological and speculative design. Chapters include Program Art or Be Programmed, Subvert!, Citizen Science, Artists in White Coats and Latex Gloves, The Maker Moment and The Overview Effect.
2011
Hackers of the Renaissance
We imagine that hacking is a modern phenomenon, and a nefarious one at that. But hacking is a mindset that dates back four centuries.
2013
GIFPOP!
In 2013, artists Rachel Binx and Sha Hwang launched gifpop!, an online service to convert your animated GIFs into physical animated lenticular sheets. As part of their Kickstarter campaign, they asked me to provide a little historical perspective to their lovely little project. The result is an essay about optical effects related to lenticular technologies.
2013
The NeoLucida Interludes
As part of the NeoLucida Kickstarter Campaign, I included occasional art-historical essays for project backers. Usually, Kickstarter project creators use updates to inform about production progress, shipping details, or other project news. Since the NeoLucida was born out of a rich art history, backers were asking questions like "What is a camera lucida?" and "Is a camera lucida like a camera obscura?" So in between project updates, backers got these "Interludes", diving into camera lucida and art history topics.
2013