constraint

L’art est toujours le résultat d’une contrainte. Croire qu’il s’élève d’autant plus haut qu’il est plus libre, c’est croire que ce qui retient le cerf-volant de monter, c’est sa corde.”

Of the many potentialities afforded by the computer, one of the most significant is its capacity to operate as a search engine. If, then, we think through the logic of the search in the context of ‘design’, what such an approach suggests is that if all possible solutions already exist, it is simply a question of defining a set of constraints and conducting a search, and then selecting one of the many outcomes. The potential implications of this are far reaching. Not only does it challenge the traditional notion of the ‘genius’ of the architect/designer and the originality of the work of art, but it also suggests that if there is still any creativity in the ‘design’ process, it should lie, firstly, in defining the constraints that generate the range of possible solutions to a problem, and, secondly, in developing an effective method of filtering or evaluating them