Cantinas

Cantinas were a series of monthly casual video chats, organized by the on-the-fly research group. Each session was hosted by one or more members of the community revolving around a different question. Rather than focusing on tools and specific programming languages, these meetups provided a space to discuss aesthetics, meta levels and how we relate to live coding - both as artists and as audience. Moreover, specific subjects, concerns, perspectives and questions ranging from virtuality to machine learning were discussed between peers. The series of cantinas carried out set the pace of the research line of the project. At the following link you will find a report "on-the-fly-cantina" of some Cantinas described by the members of the research group, named: Iván Paz, Anne Veinberg, Patrick Borgeat and Luka Frelih.

Introduction

on-the-fly is a Creative Europe co-funded project initiated by Hangar in Barcelona, in cooperation with Creative Coding Utrecht, Ljudmila Art and Science Laboratory, Ljubljana, and ZKM | Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe, which aims to support and foster the exchange of the different practices among live coding communities. In this research space we discuss, explore, identify, reflect on and imagine creative directions in the live coding practice. Live coding activities have many layers and composer-programmers have spent extensive hours designing, understanding, or extending numerous languages or libraries before performing with them. In addition, reflecting on live coding nature and possibilities contextualizes and restricts the possible paths to follow. This is an essential process as the possibilities would otherwise be infinite. With this in mind, the on-the-fly research group holds monthly casual video meetups for the live coding community under the title on-the-fly cantina. Each session follows a distinct central question and is hosted by a member of the research group or another member from the live coding community. Rather than focusing on tools and specific programming languages, these meetups have provided a space to discuss aesthetics, meta levels and how we relate to live coding - both as artists and as audience. In this paper we report on four of these sessions that touched on different live coding practices, activities, concepts and artistic questions. The topics included in this paper represent an incomplete live coding panorama and the aim is not to give an elaborate overview or thorough discussion but to present a compilation of opinions and ideas exchanged in the video chat sessions. Nevertheless these reports might serve as a pool of ideas that can be investigated further in a more thorough and scientific way or can just be used for personal inspiration. The central questions of the sessions reported on in this paper are: “ Now that we have gathered - what shall we discuss?”, “How alive is a live-streamed Algorave”, and ˝Live Coding Machine Learning˝.

Now that we have gathered - what shall we discuss?

True to the meeting’s theme, the opening session of the on-the-fly cantina made space for participants to share their thoughts, ideas, struggles and interests in live coding. Following a brief introduction by those present, a number of themes and questions were brought up. These can be subdivided into a few main areas. 1) When is live coding, live coding and the relevance of the live coding manifesto. 2) the music and language trends in live coding. 3) the performance practice of live coding. 4) Other topics.

2.1 When is live coding, live coding and the relevance of the live coding manifesto

A question that arises at almost every live coding conference or gathering: when is live coding still live coding when the “from scratch” concept is no longer a signature move, where does the line for what is still live coding get drawn? In our discussion, a key point which arose was the out of date nature of the TOPLAP Manifesto which is still often the primary reference when starting this discussion. Whilst the manifesto is a crucial historic document for live coding, when it was conceived there was a lack of critical vocabulary to describe live coding as the art form had just emerged. Perhaps it is time to sit down and rethink the manifesto to reflect where live coding is today, where it has come from and where it will go so that we are not still mindlessly quoting “show us your screens”! After all, what are we proposing with live coding? What affordances can live coding offer to the artist that a different artistic practice may not allow?

2.2 the music and language trends in live coding

Live coding has drawn in a wide range of people from both musical, visual and computer science backgrounds. However, just as easily as it has drawn some of us in, it has also pushed some of us out. There was a feeling in this cantina that Algoraves tend to dominate the public image of live coding and that more live coding events that present non-dance style music would benefit from getting the same spotlight. One of the issues that was brought up is that Algoraves presents a more homogenous use of technologies within live coding and do not represent the broader live coding communities. Furthermore, the English language is still at the root of the majority of live coding environments. If more non-english based live coding platforms would be developed/promoted, perhaps the community could be more inclusive. In the future we also wonder, could there be a google translate type service for different live coding languages?

2.3 the performance practice of live coding

Considering the majority of live coding performances are done via a computer, the issue of stage presence is one we found of importance. Perhaps a conventional stage-audience setup is not best suited for a live coding performance? Should live coding performances always be considered as an audio-visual experience or is this dependent on the setting and context. At times, not viewing the code can also heighten the audience's experience whilst at others, how are we to experience the “live” in live coding and, now to shamelessly quote the manifesto, “have access to the performer’s mind”? And where does “show us your screens” leave visualist live coders who’s code and visuals make use of the same visual space? Perhaps placing more importance on the coding editor used could enhance the performative experience. If the editors better reflected the gestural elements of the coding or became agents in themselves by placing limitations on how you code so as to remain legible, this could contribute to the performance practise. Tangible controllers, physical instruments and hybrid settings offer another approach to live coding performance presence.

2.4 Other topics

Visuals and coding is another theme we felt is under discussed in the current live coding discourse. Visuals are often used to enhance the music and rarely take centre stage - can we explore other relationships between visuals and music? Finally, the majority of visuals produced within live coding is abstract, in the cantina there was interest in creating non abstract movie style live coded visuals. Other topics brought up in this session included reflections on the current means of communication within the live coding community - primarily the shift from a centralised TOPLAP forum to language specific discord channels. If one assumes transparency as a live coding principle, does “faking” the code during a performance due to technical failure remain true to the art form? Will technologies evolve so much in the coming years that the conversations we are having now no longer make sense? Is sharing code on Github (or similar) post performance really reflective of the performance in any way or what are other means of documenting or saving performances that have taken place? Finally, in the spirit of a cantina, we would like to have more live coding recipes and cooking events.