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Image of Gallery in South Kensington
Request to view at the Prints & Drawings Study Room, room 405M , Case SR2, Shelf 3

0305-08

Print
May 2002 (printed)
Artist/Maker
Place of origin

Harold Cohen (born 1928) is a painter, printmaker and designer of textiles, but he is perhaps best known as the creator of AARON, a computer program utilising artificial intelligence (the branch of computer science concerned with making computers behave like humans) to generate artworks. AARON was conceived (around 1973) as the first in a projected series of programs but in fact Cohen is still working with AARON today. His creation of this program grew out of what he has described as his need 'to understand what art is'. In the process of designing a program to work with random variables, making its own decisions on colouring and composition, he explored the potential inherent in different programming languages.

Initially AARON produced drawings which were then coloured by Cohen. Most recently he has modified the program so that it chooses and applies the colours itself, resulting in digital prints which are the unmediated work of AARON. Cohen insists that display labels and image credits for prints produced by AARON should read "Digital print by AARON, a computer program written by Harold Cohen". To produce prints on this unprecedented scale Cohen has used one of the new wide-format printers, with archival pigment inks.


Object details

Categories
Object type
Title0305-08 (assigned by artist)
Materials and techniques
Digital print by AARON, a computer program written by Harold Cohen
Brief description
Digital inkjet print, abstracted floral imagery in yellow and green, by Harold Cohen, printed United States, 2003
Physical description
A print of abstracted floral imagery printed in vivid colours, predominantly yellows and greens
Dimensions
  • Height: 127cm
  • Width: 90cm
  • Of paper height: 177.2cm
  • Of paper width: 123.1cm
Copy number
2/3
Marks and inscriptions
  • '0305-08' (Title; in pencil, lower left below image)
  • 'Harold Cohen May 2002' (Signature and date; in pencil, lower right below image)
Credit line
Given by Harold Cohen
Summary
Harold Cohen (born 1928) is a painter, printmaker and designer of textiles, but he is perhaps best known as the creator of AARON, a computer program utilising artificial intelligence (the branch of computer science concerned with making computers behave like humans) to generate artworks. AARON was conceived (around 1973) as the first in a projected series of programs but in fact Cohen is still working with AARON today. His creation of this program grew out of what he has described as his need 'to understand what art is'. In the process of designing a program to work with random variables, making its own decisions on colouring and composition, he explored the potential inherent in different programming languages.

Initially AARON produced drawings which were then coloured by Cohen. Most recently he has modified the program so that it chooses and applies the colours itself, resulting in digital prints which are the unmediated work of AARON. Cohen insists that display labels and image credits for prints produced by AARON should read "Digital print by AARON, a computer program written by Harold Cohen". To produce prints on this unprecedented scale Cohen has used one of the new wide-format printers, with archival pigment inks.
Bibliographic reference
Collection
Accession number
E.264-2005

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Record createdAugust 1, 2005
Record URL
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