The CEO of my former company, Sean Moss-Pultz, once stated that he believes in the Internet era, the new generation of artists must know how to program. I heard the same thing again from a friend of mine, who is (supposed to be ;-) an artist as well. If you give it some thought, it actually makes a lot of sense.
This starts with the fact that the tools we used to create artwork are becoming digitized. Many will resist but the resistance will be futile, just like writing with pen and paper or sending a greeting card. Yes, it's still there and people still do that, but it's drifting further and further away from the mainstream.
So, what does this mean? Digitized tools generate digitized works, and digitized works could be easily modified by software. So, if an artist's technique could be achieved by software means, then boom, everyone could do the same. For example, combining two images on the same photo used to be an art, and shooting firework pictures used to be difficult.
In the end, it all comes down to creativity. Artists can use the same tools and materials to create something different, and that cannot be taught by software. In other words, they use the existing stuffs in a 'creative' way. In a not so ancient time, people do tricks on films, modify lens, etc. to be creative, and nowadays people use software tools. However, it's rather constrained by the toolbox of the software, and people may have a hard time to use/misuse these to mirror the idea in their mind, which may or may not be what these are designed to do.
Now what's the most direct and flexiable way to manipulate digits? What's the most powerful tool? "Programming" comes to mind. We have seen a lot like this before: Processing, Pure Data, etc. ,and we see more and more like this, for example, a programmable camera.
What does this mean? I don't know. People say you use right brain to do art, left brain to do math. Programming is considered to be more like a left brain thing, and now you have to use it to create art? I guess this means we need a more intuitive, less 'mathematical' programming tool, and it doesn't have to be a 'language'. It could be something like App Inventor, in which you can create program by putting together building blocks, just like LEGO.
By the way, I know the title does not really match the content, but I still like it. ;-)
