Troy Rhoades. Concordia University, Montreal. Perhaps the peculiarity of art is to pass through the finite in order to rediscover, to restore the infinite.—Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, What is Philosophy? (Deleuze and Guattari, 1994: 197) Science and Art When encountering John F. Simon Jr.’s software artwork Every Icon (1997) on his website, it can be difficult for viewers to know whether they are seeing the visual execution of a mathematical theorem or experiencing a work of artistic expression. [1] This is because they are presented with a stark white and black thirty-two by thirty-two square grid on the right side of the website and three statements that read like a mathematical theorem on the left side. They state: Given: An icon described by a 32 X 32 grid. Allowed: Any element of the grid to be coloured black or white. Shown: Every icon (Simon, 1997b). [2] But before […]
John Tinnell. Department of English, University of Florida. Over the past decade, the humanities disciplines have played host to an explosion of ecologically themed transformations, which continue to open up new (sub)fields of research and teaching. The development of the ecological turn in English studies (conceived broadly to house the study of literature, composition, film, and new media) resonates with the general evolution of the eco-humanities; indeed, English departments have led this movement in many respects. A survey of English’s recent appropriations of ecological ideas (and their failings) establishes a point of departure for rethinking the eco-humanities. Ecocriticism, with its reputable journals and popular conferences, has no doubt become the most institutionalised of English’s eco-fields, while more pointed approaches continue to gather loosely around terms such as green cultural studies, ecofeminism, ecocomposition, and ecomedia studies.[1] At the turn of this century, much of the early work in ecocriticism was devoted […]