Multimidedia, Code, and Cultural Interfaces in Cybernetic Poetry: Some Conclusions of a Study on the Artistic Practices of the Rozdzielczość Chleba Collective

Grzegorz JĘDREK

Department of Theory and Anthropology of Literature, Institute of Literary Studies, Faculty of Humanities, John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin, Al. Racławickie 14, 20-950 Lublin, Poland , Poland

Abstract

The article discusses a departure of a Polish artistic collective called Rozdzielczość Chleba from the traditionally understood poetry towards linguistic multimedia art, generative art, and art based on interfaces. The textual understanding of the collective’s work, as rooted in a single medium, seems insufficient. Meanwhile, the experience of cybernetic poetry, practiced by the aforementioned group, is a multi-sensory experience. A researcher following this type of phenomena must deviate from the textual paradigm, use methodologies developed in other research fields, and be able to correctly interpret digital experimental literature. In the present article the author draws consequences from three axioms he has proposed: (1) The media are sensual in character and the multimedia provide multi-sensory experiences. (2) The language of the media (including multimedia and intermedia), programming language, and natural language are the three linguistic experiences present in the new media, in particular in electronic literature, i.e., the linguistic art of new media. (3) Interfaces, data operations, and data are the three layers of an electronic literary work.

Keywords:

electronic literature, e-literature, digital poetry, new media, literature, literary theory, Rozdzielczość Chleba, language, media, multimedia, senses