Applications of Randomness - Literature, Music and Art

Literature, Music and Art

Some aesthetic theories claim to be based on randomness in one way or another. Little testing is done in these situations, and so claims of reliance on and use of randomness are generally abstract.

An example of a need for randomness sometimes occurs in arranging items in an art exhibit. Usually this is avoided by using a theme. As John Cage pointed out, "While there are many ways that sounds might be produced, few are attempted". Similarly, the arrangement of art in exhibits is often deliberately non-random. One case of this was Hitler's attempt to portray modern art in the worst possible light by arranging works in worst possible manner. A case can be made for trying to make art in the worst possible way; i.e., either as anti-art, or as actually random art.

Dadaism, as well as many other movements in art and letters, has attempted to accommodate and acknowledge randomness in various ways. Often people mistake order for randomness based on lack of information; e.g., Jackson Pollock's drip paintings, Helen Frankenthaler's abstractions (e.g., "For E.M."). Thus, in some theories of art, all art is random in that it's "just paint and canvas" (the explanation of Frank Stella's work).

Similarly, the "unexpected" ending is part of the nature of interesting literature. An example of this is Denis Diderot's novel Jacques le fataliste (literally: James the Fatalist; sometimes referred to as Jacques the Fatalist or Jacques the Servant and his Master). At one point in the novel, Diderot speaks directly to the reader:

Now I, as the author of this novel might have them set upon by thieves, or I might have them rest by a tree until the rain stops, but in fact they kept on walking and then near night-fall they could see the light of an inn in the distance.

(not an exact quote). Diderot was making the point that the novel (then a recent introduction to European literature) seemed random (in the sense of being invented out of thin air by the author). See also Eugenio Montale, Theatre of the Absurd.

Randomness in music is generally thought to be postmodern, including John Cage's chance derived Music of Changes, Iannis Xenakis' stochastic music, aleatoric music, indeterminate music, or generative music.