One Hundred Views of a Single Theme

beyond max bill's theme and variations:
"one hundred views of a single theme."

"concrete art holds an infinite number of possibilities" (Max Bill)

Max Bill produced his series "Fifteen variations on a single theme" from mind, rule, compass, and traditional drawing instruments.

quite differently. what i present here results from mind and the geometrical programming of a computer.

i created software guided by Max Bill's comments and his lithographs. . . of course this software was not meant to remake Max Bill's work published sixty years ago. although it can do that - imperfectly by design, but the gist of it certainly (readers are encouraged to look for Max Bill's original works; for those who cannot, these links will provide useful hints):
the single theme, variation 1, v2, v3, v4, v5, v6, v7, v8, v9, v10, v11, v12, v13, v14, v15.

on the contrary, the software was written to allow infinite expansions, extensions and explorations of and beyond the seminal theme and the variations, in the spirit of the introduction to "fifteen variations on a single theme". it is meant to help discover the infinite number of possibilities, these unpublished variations which are hinted at by Max Bill ("it would be posssible to develop other variations on the same theme and [...] to reverse or develop the theme itself or to combine the variations with each other or to try other colour combinations.").

new works result, altogether original and faithful tribute to the spirit of this inspiring series, all meta-variations of the single theme:
(1) t16, t4-nan, t64, t64-sand, t12-sand,
(2) v1c12, v1c12a-ink, v9a18, v15a7, v16-5-5,
(3) v16a-7-7, v16b-6-6, v16b-4-12, v6c-7-7, v6c-9-9,
(4) v6c-16-6, v15d16-7, v6d9-17, v6d6-11, v6e11-13,
(5) v6de9-13, v6dc24-13, v16-13-13, v15d16-9, v6de11-11,
(6) v17-13-17, v18-13-17, v19-13, v20-17, v21-12,
(7) v22-5, v23-47, v23-17, v22a6, v22a4,
(8) v22b4, v22c4-clip, v22c12, v22c17, v6df-clip,
(9) v13a-10, v13a-12, v13a-4.1, v13a-4.2, t9-by-hand,
(10) v-am-7, v-ja-5, v-ek-11, v15a7-ink, v1g17,
(11) v6eggs-17-17, v6eggx-17-17, v6eggy-17-17, v6eggz-17-17, v6eggz-17-29,
(12) v6egz-29-29, v6eggz-11-37, v16d-17-17.11, v16egs, v16eggs,
(13) v16fgs, v-rl-11, v-k101, v-k164, v-k184,
(14) v-k187, v-k191, v-k192, v-k210, v-k227, v-k258,
(15) v-disegno, v-still-7, v-mifmab, wR-8, v-voro-11c,
(16) v-voro-23g, v-voro-23l, v-voro-37, max-buche-de-noel, mbv-kb1.jpg,
(17) mbv-kb2.jpg, mbv-kb3.jpg, mbv-kb4.jpg, , [work in progress: 83 in Jun'99].

soon , there will be up to one hundred views of a single theme... (we note that these views, emulating the fifteen variations, would please us more if they too, came accompanied by their own synopsis so that we understand each better; they eventually will). these raw images, once polished and brought up to printing size and resolution, are definitely bold and striking, and encourage matching prints in small groups in many ways.

further, these exploration facilities can be applied to different themes and thus extend the principles set forth by Max Bill to distinctly new realms of creation.

contemplated extensions: a further step would be -combining principles similar to litterate programming (Donald Knuth) with those of evolving programming (John Holland)- to propose for each piece thus created a clear synopsis explaining how it came into being.
[ march'99: I am currently trying to implement litterate programming around LyX and Metapost ].

other extensions or synthesis of works of art have happened before, witness Jean Tinguely's meta sculptures, and especially the meta-malevitch and meta-kandinsky mechanical series (1955-56), or Michael Noll's Computer Composition with Lines series (1965). some of these are waiting to be challenged from software side. in the hundred views series a few meta-metas compound the game, visual puns, digital "a la" Josef Albers, Elsworth Kelly, Agnes Martin, Pietr Mondrian and Roy Lichstenstein. there is also a time piece with Pietr Mondrian kinship but Max Bill's theme soul (or rather, its anima) and even a coloured-time piece (look versus feel: the very familiar Mondrian style overwhelms the more secret Bill rhythm).
[ nov'98: I am currently working on software meta-villon pieces ]

the chapter twelve of "Methamagical Themas: Questing for the Essence of Mind and Pattern" by Martin Gardner (Basic Books 1985): "Variations 0n a Theme as the Crux of Creativity, is clearly on topic, as well as chapter thirteen: "Metafont, Metamathematics and Metaphysics...".

March 1999
Peter Alpers is showing a first sampling of the first prints of the first of four books of the "One Hundred Views of a Single Theme" in his Boston Gallery :
Alpers Fine Art, 1380 Curve Street, Carlisle, MA (978) 287-0658.
i wrote a general statement statement about the work for this opening. the twenty-four prints for the first book have been printed and curated by Jennifer Mahlman. and here are four examples of them at about 1/4 scale: 1-20, 1-22, 1-23, 1-24.

September 1998
the "One Hundred Views of a Single Theme" have been completed by July 2nd 1998. in fact a 100 views have been selected from more than 400 (the 100 are actually 102, like Hokusai's "One Hundred Views of Mount Fuji"); this selection is not the work in progress posted above.

i reviewed the final editing by Jon Cone & Andre Ribuoli on September 12th 1998. now the Views have received a Bon A Tirer for Cone Edition Press (East Topsham, Vermont) to publish a limited edition of them (fifteen on Sommerset Book paper). the entire series will be commented, released in four books over many months or years, and the books eventually will be presented in an illustrated linen portfolio.

two other and smaller series --one of ten (July'98), another of twenty one (Sep'98) related prints, may be published by C.E.P. (fifteen on Arches paper).

a small set of other views has being published by Cadence Research Systems (Bloomington, Indiana) as illustrations for "Chez Scheme System Manual, Revision 3" (Chez Scheme by Kent Dybvig and Mathematica by Stephen Wolfram et al. are my favorite programming media).

these different editions will soon be presented and documented in detail on this and their respective sites.

Other themes
[ sep'98: i am currently working on different themes rendered with the paradigms and software developed here. work in progress examples : 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 ]

Max Bill later created a suite of a related spirit, "the sixteen constellations", around the theme of three lines of the same length.

About Max Bill
"Geboren in Winterthur am 22. Dezember 1908, gestorben in Berlin am 16. Dezember 1994.
sMax Bill war als Bildhauer, Architekt, Graphiker, Designer, Kunsttheoretiker und Publizist eine ausgesprochene Mehrfachbegabung. Von 1927-1929 studierte er am Bauhaus in Dessau und wurde dort auch von der de Stjil-Gruppe beeinflusst. Er vertrat eine umfassende künstlerische Formung unserer Umwelt. Unter anderem entwickelte er Schleifenplastiken aus dem Möbiusschen Band, und er baute 1936 und 1951 die Schweizer Pavillons der Triennalen in Mailand. von 1951 bis 1956 war Bill Direktor der Ulmer Hochschule für Gestaltung, deren Gebäude er von 1953-1955 baute." (by Alexander Bieri)

"Among the modern classics are Paul Klee (1879-1940) and the main representatives of the Zurich movement of 'concrete artists', Richard P. Lohse (1902-1988) and Max Bill (born 1908). Pioneers of the surrealist movement include Meret Oppenheim (1913) the sculptor Robert Mueller (born 1920), Jean Tinguely (1925-1991) and Bernhard Luginbuehl (born 1929)." (by Swiss Embassy)

internet search, january'99: there is not a real max bill page yet...
http://www.archinform.de/arch/1031.htm
http://www.mailcom.ch/private/literature.html
http://www.artbr.com.br/casa/
http://www.israel.org/mfa/ariel/103-agm.html
http://www.invers.de/invers/inhalt/95_06_bauhaus.html
http://www.mathematik.uni-ulm.de/stadtulm/unt/05/06.en.html
http://www.mathematik.uni-ulm.de/stadtulm/unt/02/02/15.de.html
http://www.mkgraphic.com/basic.html
http://www.guernsey.net/~gallery/vincenzo.html
http://www.mclink.it/n/dwpress/donnarte/4_98/donnarte.htm
http://www.newschool.edu/library/parcoll.htm
http://www.abaa-booknet.com/catalogs/delakcat/200-1b2.html
http://www.swissemb.org/culture/html/fine_arts.html
http://www.tfaoi.com/newsmu/nmus66.htm

beyond max bill's theme and variations: "one hundred views of a single theme."

beyond max bill's theme and variations:
"one hundred views of a single theme."