Entropy Made Visible

Robert Smithson (1938 -1973) is an American artist commonly associated with the land and process art movements. In this interview he discuses the preoccupation with entropy that has influenced his work.

Smithson has his own interpretation of entropy and how it has informed his art. He says “On the whole I would say entropy contradicts the usual notion of a mechanistic world view. In other words it’s a condition that’s irreversible, it’s a condition that’s moving towards a gradual equilibrium and it’s suggested in many ways.” (189)

Smithson takes a pessimistic view of entropy or he seems at least to be interested in examples of negative irreversible change. He discusses entire cities being permanently flooded and includes photos of earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. However perhaps he does not see these as negative; he says “I don’t find these depressing” (192). However phrases like: “There is still the heat death of the sun.” (191) do seem fairly pessimistic. Essentially he is saying entropy means that the earth is a closed system and that a closed system eventually deteriorates beyond repair.

Smithson admits to a fascination with disaster and frames this as a human need. He says “It seems that there’s almost a hope for disaster. There’s that desire for spectacle. I know when I was a kid I used to love to watch the hurricanes come and blow the trees down and rip up the sidewalks. I mean it fascinated me. There’s a kind of pleasure one receives on that level.” (196)

Jeffrey S. Wicken discusses entropy in the article ‘Entropy and Evolution: Ground Rules for Discourse’. He is discussing these concepts in a scientific context however he highlights some of the confusion that has arisen around entropy between scientific disciplines. He says “That thermodynamics is much misunderstood by the biological community is hardly surprising, considering that the history of the entropy concept has invited misunderstandings and semantic imprecisions.” (23)

Wicken criticises some of the broader applications of the term entropy. He says that “Entropy was formulated as that state function in thermodynamics that had the property of increasing in irreversible processes.” (23) Here he is saying that entropy was the name given to one particular function or equation and that he thinks that the term should not just be applied to anything that behaves similarly. An example of this that he discusses is the attempt to apply this function, entropy, as a concept in information theory (Smithson references this also in the interview with Sky (190)). He says that there are similarities between entropy in thermodynamics and information theory but that they are not the same and that “One needs rather to be healthily wary of the impulse to generalize from equation to concept.” (25) He suggests that there are entropies (indicating differences between the applications) and then there is entropy as it is used in thermodynamics (which means that specific function).

This article only discusses the misunderstandings that occur within the scientific community and does not go into the implications of this confusion outside the sciences. For me however the amount of confusion inside the scientific community raises the question of whether artists should borrow from science at all. Also in relation to artists like Smithson who are borrowing specific concepts or ideas, should the demonstration of their understanding of these concepts be under scrutiny?

Peter Lloyd Jones has written about the use of entropy in art. He deals specifically with the attraction and possible relevance of the use of entropy in art. He discuses how entropy can be interpreted pessimistically and used as “a grandiose metaphor for degeneration and decrepitude.” (30) He also points out that certain uses of the term entropy as a metaphor can exhaust the scientific content of the term completely (32). I think he is raising a good point about the use of a scientific term or idea out of context and whether or not this is appropriate as misuse can lead to the scientific content of the term being lost. In relation to the use of entropy by artists, using Smithson as a specific example, he concludes that “Even methodically to correct the errors in their use of thermodynamics is to miss the irony. In Smithson’s polemic ‘Entropy and the New Monuments’, the quotations from Bridgeman on Thermodynamics sits down on the page with Alice Through the Looking Glass.” (Jones 34)

So then, Wicken believes it is dangerous to try and form a concept from an equation and certainly in the sciences this may be a valid observation but does it hold any weight for artists, like Smithson, who have embraced entropy as a concept. I, for one, think that it’s fine for artists to explore terms that do not directly apply to their own disciplines. I agree with Jones in that to focus on the errors is to miss the point of the work.

One Quote from Smithson that particularly intrigued me was: “Now there may be a point where the earth’s surface will collapse and break apart, so that the irreversible process will be in a sense metamorphosized, it is evolutionary, but it’s not evolutionary in terms of any idealism. There is still the heat death of the sun. It may be that human beings are just different from dinosaurs rather than better.” (Smithson 191) This was in relation to a question about how entropy related to evolution. This quote may seem overly pessimistic but for me it highlights a potential way to think of evolution, as change not necessarily for the better but just as change, which was not how I had previously considered the term. I think Smithson’s work, including his discussions and writings, can make his point of view and ideas accessible. However I do not think his work should be seen as an accurate scientific illustration but more as an artistic investigation.

I think that in the end contemporary scientific thought influences the way people think in general as well as influencing art and culture. In other words artists will be influenced by contemporary thought whether or not they do this intentionally. Therefore artists are borrowing from other disciplines anyway and there is no reason to question those artists who want to explore scientific concepts outright.

References:

Holt, Nancy, ed. The writings of Robert Smithson. New York: New York University Press, 1979. Print.

Jones, Peter Lloyd. "Some thoughts on Ruldolf Arnheim’s book “Entropy and Art”." Leonardo Vol. 6 (1973): p. 29-35. JSTOR. Web. 05/05/2010.

Wicken, Jeffrey S. "Entropy and Evolution: Ground Rules for Discourse." Systematic Zoology Vol. 35 (1986): p.22-36. JSTOR. Web. 05/05/2010.