Description of Chance Drawings - artwork created by rolling dice, chance, statistics, probability art

-This list of randomly generated number and letter combinations is used as a guide for applying ‘letters’ or lines to the grid modules on a chance drawing. These number-letter combinations can also be considered as names for the letters.

-The order in which the list must be used can be sequentially left to right/top to bottom, or right to left/bottom to top. It can also be used starting at any point in the entire list, going forward or backward sequentially.

-Following the entries in the list, the alphabet lines are then applied sequentially to the modules of the grids, either horizontally or vertically, module by module and row by row, but always following a repetitive, orderly progression.

-Note that no identification of color application is found in this list. The arbitrary decision of whether or not to add color comes after the grids are filled.

-The notebook contains 3,087 entries.

-More information can be added to each module by the application of color to it as shown in this modified alphabet.

-Another coin is flipped for each ‘letter’ and heads or tails indicates where the color is to be applied.

-Color is only added once to a module and the choice of a hue is arbitrary.

-A coin flip of a heads means the color may only be applied above or to the right of the line in the module.

-A flip of a tails means the color may only be applied below or to the left of the line in the module.

Special cases include:

-A 2H or a 12H never has color added to its module.

-A 12H or a 12T always has color added, filling the module, without the need to flip a coin.

-If a heads comes up for a 4H or a 4T, the color is always applied to the lower right or upper right of the diagonal line. If a tails comes up for a 4H or 4T, the color is always applied to the lower left or the upper left of the diagonal line.

-If a line is found on one edge of a module and a flip of a heads or tails would place the color outside of the module, color is not added. For example, an 8H has a vertical line on the left hand edge of the module. If a T is rolled, no color is added.

-If an H is rolled, color is added to the right of the line, filling the module.

-Adding color gives any ‘letter’ a new name. For example a 5H with an H added for color becomes a 5HH; a 5H with a T added for color becomes a 5HT.

These drawings gave me, at least partially, the opportunity to work with chance as part of the process of making a drawing. It meant giving up control over some of the visual results. The inspiration came first from reading I have been doing in certain areas of theoretical physics. In particular, it came from my interest in the quantum world where events can only be understood and determined by probability. Nothing is certain in the world of small particles.  A single electron can be in many places at the same time and take many simultaneous paths from A to B. Only when it is observed by experiment does it land in a specific place. Even then it is never stationary. We cannot control events as they unfold in the micro scale of the quantum world; at best we can only make predictions about probable outcomes.

Back in the macro world, it is refreshing to give up a certain amount of control in making art. But, there are also many arbitrary and subjective choices I made in the drawings of this series. A general description of the process of making these drawings will demonstrate the various moments where I kept control of a visual result, or not.

I began with a group of 28 line configurations including two points. This group is my alphabet of marks or more metaphorically, ‘letters’. Each represents a roll of two dice followed by a flip of a coin. One line may represent a roll of a 7 followed by a flip of heads (7H), a different type of line represents a roll of a 3 followed by a flip of tails (3T) and so on. These designations are the names for the letters of my alphabet. Each of these designated marks relates to the others in being able to be placed in a square, a module, of the same dimension.

I then compiled a randomly generated master list of dice rolls and coin flips, 2T, 6H, 11T, 10HT, and so on. These are kept in a notebook. There are presently 3,087 entries.

To control where these lines may be placed in a drawing, I arbitrarily created grids of lines that may be flat and square, but also diminishing in perspective, curved or combined to form three-dimensional volumes. These planes, or membranes, are placed on the drawing following a visual idea or concept of my choosing.

Next, I filled the grids with the letters of my line alphabet; each module in the grid received a letter. To do this I used the master list. I can proceed forward or backward with the list and start at any point in it, but I follow whatever order is there with out skipping an entry or jumping ahead. The grids are filled in an orderly process, for example either left/right or right/left by columns and top/down or bottom/up by rows. So, the lines and points are applied with no immediate control over what letter follows another as the alphabet is placed in the modules of the grid.

Once the grid or grids are filled, the drawing is complete or a decision is then made to introduce color. Color is added by a process of again flipping a coin which determines where in a given module of the grid the color is placed, left or right of a vertical line, above or below a horizontal line. The choice of color is subjective and arbitrary.

Finally, in some of the drawings another very subjective decision might be made about the drawing as a visual whole. Graphite might be added to obscure parts of grids or their relationship to each other. Lines or color might be added to create additional connections between letters in adjacent grids. These decisions might in turn lead to more coin flipping, another layer of chance input.

I have mentioned my interest in theoretical physics leading to the incorporation of chance in this work. There is also a particular idea that I’ve seen in reference to Information Theory and Black Hole Theory that has informed this series. It is called the Holographic Principle and it has influenced Chance Drawings #5, #6 and #9. In my own words, the principle suggests that the total amount of information that a given volume can contain is limited by the number of Planck bits or units on the surface of an envelope containing that volume. A Planck unit is very small and perhaps the smallest area that can exist in our universe (it is 10 to the minus 33 centimeters on a side). In any case, the grids that combine to envelope volumes in some of the drawings do contain their information in bits, in the letters and colors within the modules. There is a hierarchy of information in the drawings.

Another inspiration from theoretical physics is seen in Chance Drawing #8. A cosmological concept that has emerged from String Theory posits that the origin of our particular universe came about by the collision of two membranes floating in a more infinite and more ancient universe than our own. Furthermore, the smallest particles of our presumed reality are thought to be strings and loops of energy that belong on these membranes and may move between them. I think of the grids found in these drawings as membranes containing information and that the membranes commute with each other.

In a gesture of full disclosure, I admit that the process of giving up control to chance and random acts was surprisingly difficult at times. After flipping 10 tails in a row, I found myself desperately wanting a heads. When following the master list and adding letters to the grids I became at times visually frustrated by the repetition of certain kinds of lines or points. I was often unhappy with the way color was accumulating. I even cheated on myself once in a while, maybe skipped an entry in my grand list or giving myself a second chance on a coin flip! I find the relationship between art and personal control quite complex.

Ultimately, however, I’m interested in the information which these drawings contain and where it comes from. Bits of information are presented in the form of symbols - lines and points - that in turn represent acts of chance. These symbolic bits are integrated into the drawing via various random processes. Subjective free will is added at stages in the process of creating a drawing that communicates an idea. The final and total amount of information in the drawings includes chance and free will, giving up control and asserting it.