In his Eyeo talk, Casey Reas argues that code needs a bit of “noise” for it to stay visually interesting and prevent it from becoming homgoneous. From that part of his talk, I understood that he meant adding some kind of elements or means to differentiate different iteration of the code/art work. Reas outlook on this is similar to my plans for how I’ll make use of randomness withing my art. I intent top incorporate a few different elements within my work that will be randomized each time the code is rerun. My goal in doing this is to achieve some sort of similarity between each unique iteration while also having it so each one a some kind of distinction from the rest.
I think there may not be one definitive answer for the optimum balance between total randomnens and complete control. Rather, it depends on each individual case and the type of art the artists is trying to make, as well as what their goals for that artwork is. However If an artist leans too heavily into either direction they could risk their art being too random to the point where there is no clear idea behind the art and the “noise”, as Reas would call it has no real meaning, or it could be too controlled where the result may be too predicable. However, this does raise a question for me, how would we as viewers be able to distinguish between these? For example, at what point does the randomness or noise become too much or lose its meaning?