Indeterminacy, Intention, and Exploratory Creative Practices

Enrico Dorigatti, University of Portsmouth

Although disconnections between how we think about doing and how we actually do indeed affect the practice, discrepancies could serve as elements to foster creativity rather than inhibiting it.

If our creative practice perfectly follows and overlaps our thoughts on and descriptions of doing, where does creative exploration lie, and how can we expand our aesthetic vision, hone our arsenal of techniques, and, in general, broaden our horizons? In other words, where do creativity, artistic novelty, and innovation fit and thrive if limited by the vocabulary we use to design and express our ideas and practices before enacting them?

The questions proposed do not counter a more structural approach to art-making where doing is tightly intertwined with, or possibly led by, thinking and planning. On the contrary, they aim to support a position where free artistic exploration and diversions from any planned and reasoned strategy are necessary to push forward the practice itself by adding unexpected, unpredictable, and formerly unconsidered aspects of novelty. Such features might not immediately fit as they are—whether they are a sound, an image, or a technique—but might give us additional inspiration to propel further our research in a self-sufficient loop.

It is worth stressing that this standpoint does not diminish the value of thinking about and describing creative practices. Rather, they acquire different functions and, instead of being regarded as the source of creativity—provided that thinking comes ahead of making—a possibility is that they could support the creation of a general guideline, a framework for the artistic practice one wants to pursue. In this scenario, the specific details and fine choices filling that frame call for consideration and evaluation on an ongoing basis as soon as they appear during the creative process and without any predetermined approach. This approach should make space and allow for unexpected discoveries to manifest and articulate within the creative flux. This approach could be defined as 'gross planning'.

However, thinking and describing could also be postponed until the creative process concludes and the artefact is realised. In this case, these two actions merge organically into 'reflecting'. This critical reflection performed a posteriori on the artwork realised and process enacted, also known as exegesis, could reveal itself as an invaluable tool to identify and understand the unexpected unfolding of a creative process and the serendipitous elements introduced, alongside their role and weight in the creative process itself. The elements identified, in turn, can be assimilated, added to the creative vocabulary available and used to describe other artworks or 'gross planning' future explorations. From this perspective, the map for sonic creativity elaborated by Andrew Knight-Hill and Emma Margetson becomes an 'evidence board', a starting point for realising a personal 'taxonomy of artistic knowledge' generated through backward reflections upon previous unchained artistic explorations pursued.

In my artistic practice, I consistently strive to incorporate the unexpected—thus impossible to think and describe a priori—as a fundamental artistic feature and driving force. Whilst this research unfolds in different directions and through diverse forms of expression, the cases in which the unexpected unfolds in its fullest are generative and interactive artworks, unforeseeable by definition as a varying degree of artistic agency is given to either a software agent or the audience, in either case shaping the artwork at runtime. hyperobject::01 is one recent audiovisual generative work employing the framework and concepts described. Its realisation followed a 'gross planning' approach, defining the most prominent characteristics, whilst all the details took shape during its realisation through testing and experimenting. A thorough reflection on the final artefact followed its completion.

Programme Notes

Modern technology exists as a hyperobject; it is immensely vast and complex—the sheer scale of it exceeds our ability to ever fully comprehend its complexity. It is all-pervading and in constant proliferation, encompassing vast networks of devices, software, and digital infrastructures that underpin our modern world.

Through the interaction of abstract imagery and sounds rooted within the post-digital and glitch aesthetics, and realised through generative and algorithmic techniques, _hyperobject::01_ aims to explore our understanding of this complex phenomenon—our limits of reality and human perception with complex concepts such as data—inviting the audience to contemplate and reflect on the vastness of the world we inhabit and our place within it, both physically and metaphorically, as technology becomes every day more ubiquitous and irreplaceable.

Biography

Enrico Dorigatti is an experimental sound artist, composer, and creative technologist working across diverse formats such as audiovisual, music composition, and generative installations. Formerly a conservatory graduate (BA and MA in electroacoustic music composition), he is currently a PhD candidate in creative technologies at the University of Portsmouth (UK). His artistic and scholarly output has been presented internationally.