2 versions of plotter drawings, untitled

Horst Bartnig (1936–2025) was virtually the only artist making computer art in East Germany: from 1979 he collaborated with mathematicians and programmers at the computing institute of the GDR Academy of Sciences in Berlin-Adlershof, where his systematic compositions were calculated and drawn by plotter. His signature 'unterbrechungen' (interruptions) works invert the machine's precision — the subject is not the exactly drawn line but the computed gaps within it, a visual pause Bartnig likened to a rest in music. These two 1985 ink-on-paper plotter drawings, sold by DAM as paired versions, reflect his method of generating multiple variants of a single mathematical configuration to make its permutations visible. Sources: https://kunstmuseum-magdeburg.de/en/horst-bartnig/ · https://www.damprojects.org/en/artists/bartnig · https://www.museum-ritter.de/en/inhalt/collection/works-in-the-collection/artists-a-f/horst-bartnig.html