Archive dig: 1967 'Computers and Automation' contest and the turning point of computer art
Merzmensch · x · 2026-11-12
AI culture researcher Merzmensch continues excavating the computer art contest archives of Computers and Automation magazine. The August 1967 issue crowned Charles Csuri as winner, with participants including Kenneth Knowlton, Frieder Nake, and Stanley Vanderbeek — founding figures of computer art.
Editor Edmund C. Berkeley's editorial "Computer Art: Turning Point" compared the computer to photography as a new artistic tool and predicted that art in the future would be as profoundly influenced by the computer as by any other medium. The previous year's fourth contest was won by Frieder Nake, alongside early algorithmic works like silk patterns and logarithmic spirals. A valuable window into the origins of generative art.
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