“I confess. I was one of those nerdy kids who got math books under the Christmas tree and checked out algebra texts at the library. Once I discovered my vocation as an artist, mathematical form gradually became part of my artistic process… As an artist who works with computers and writes code, algorithms show up everywhere in my work. My intermedia work, begun long before I started to work with computers to produce art, was built on algorithmic rules and mathematical patterns.” – Paul Hertz
The Addison was privileged to welcome artist, printmaker, musician, and Phillips Academy alum Paul Hertz ’67 to campus this winter as Edward E. Elson Artist-in-Residence. Hertz works with algorithmic processes, and his wide-ranging artistic practice focuses on how structures and processes can be translated from one medium to another. This was of particular interest to students, demonstrating ways that different disciplines can overlap and how they themselves can blend their multiple interests.
Over the course of a busy two weeks, Hertz met with a wide range of Phillips Academy courses, from Advanced Programming and Web Development to Advanced Digital Photography and Advanced Studio. He weighed in on a Philosophy course’s discussion of “What is art?” and “Who decides what art means?” and led algorithmic drawing exercises for Drawing classes. Music Theory students experimented with his work Domain, a musical composition in which instrumentalists follow a graphic score, improvising within a specified framework. The Addison Community Ambassadors, a group comprised of students from Phillips Academy and Andover High School, acted as participants in Hertz’s Ignotus the Mage project, in which digitized faces and spoken names provide the raw material for an installation that collages sounds and fragmented images to form a collective portrait.
In addition, Hertz hosted a campus lunch with the Addison Club and led an Algorithmic Drawing Workshop in partnership with Andover’s Memorial Hall Library, in which he led participants through the steps of an experimental drawing based on an algorithm. Participants were inspired by the simultaneous simplicity and complexity of the structure and left with new ideas about what art can be and the seemingly infinite possibilities that a set of rules/restrictions can generate.
Read more about Paul Hertz’s residency on the Phillips Academy website »
The Addison’s Edward E. Elson Artist-in-Residence program plays an important role in the museum’s exhibition and education programming, energetically supporting contemporary art by bringing established and emerging artists to campus. Every year, artists are invited to produce new work in the Visiting Artist Studio, exhibit in the galleries, give public talks, collaborate with students, and/or lead discussions with students from Phillips Academy and surrounding communities. Residencies range in duration from a few days, to a series of short visits, to several months. The Addison residency program began in 1946 with Charles Sheeler and continued informally until 1982 when it was endowed through the generosity of Phillips Academy alumnus Edward E. Elson, class of 1952.
Images: Students meet with Paul Hetz; photos by Addison staff
