Kon.text.e
crossover Loredana Marchi, Brussels, Belgium
2021
LAb[au], Manuel Abendroth, Jérôme Decock, Els Vermang
metal casing, custom tailored displays and electronics
abstract
As a result of combinatorial logic, random words appear only for the time needed to generate them. Their rhythm contrasts with the flow of the city, forming a fleeting urban poem that invites imagination.
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credits
special thanks to:
Kanal, Centre George Pompidou et Beliris
engineering: Denkbar
Walter Wathieu, technical assistance
text
Some Mathematics
The artwork is based on the three official, Dutch, French and German, dictionaries, without any personal editing or sorting. The choice correspond to the three official language in Belgium. The generation of the displayed word processes letter by letter, checking if the combination exist in one of these dictionaries, if yes, a third letter is drawn, if not, the system starts from scratch, until a 5 or 8 letter word is generated. In average it take 30min to generate a five letter word, a day for an eight letter word, and a month for a twelve letter word.
The language of the word results from the pure random, but pondered, drawing of the letters. The probability that a German word is generated is much higher then the one of a French or a Dutch one, since the amount of five to twelve letter words, is more then double. Further there are more different letter combination in German then in French as some letters, like K, are rarely used. In order to balance, to ponder, the system, we used statics and probabilities.
history
the artwork has been commissioned by Kanal, Centre George Pompidou themselves commissioned by the city of Brussels for the selection of an artwork for the new pedestrain bridge relating the area of compte de Flandre to the city center of Brussels.