The Laboratory and the Artist

I’m in the Cleveland Review of Books today about one of my favorite books ever, John Beck and Ryan Bishop’s Technocrats of the Imagination. You can read it here.

Perhaps my favorite part of the book is its descriptions of hidden harmonies between art and research:

Scientists shared this spirit, balking at attempts by policymakers or lab bosses to explicitly direct them, believing only self-direction and curiosity-motivated research would lead to true novelty. Vannevar Bush, director of much World War II scientific research spending, increasingly supported “blue sky” research—fundamental work without a defined goal. In his famed report Science: The Endless Frontier, he wrote that “[scientific progress came from] the free play of free intellects, working on subjects of their own choice, in the manner dictated by their curiosity for exploration of the unknown.” The research lab and the artist commune shared more than they might expect—both were self-legitimating environments that insulated experts and gave them freedom for self-directed work.

It also helped me think through why lots of recent art and technology projects frustrate me, and what makes great work:

At their worst, these collaborations produced uninteresting works, poor mishmashes that neither art nor engineering would want to claim. Artist-engineer collaborations were not always harmonious either: they spoke different languages, didn’t respect the craft of their counterparts, and were plagued by values and status differences.

We see similar challenges today. Tech companies launch creator programs that treat art as purely instrumental, or they present art as a kind of technical demo that functions as advertising. Bored big tech employees, dubbing themselves “creative technologists,” make cutesy web apps and artists attempt “research art,” both of which often are technically and creatively mediocre.

I also love how book reckons with what role art and technology both have to play societally:

“without [science], man will be the sport and victim of natural forces which he cannot control, [while without art] mankind might become a race of economic monsters, restlessly driving hard bargains with nature and one another, bored with leisure or capable of putting it to use only in ostentatious display and extravagant dissipation.”

Anyways, I loved writing it! Full piece on their site