Jean-Pierre Hébert (1939 – March 28, 2021) was an American artist of French origin. He specialized in

algorithmic art Algorithmic art or algorithm art is art, mostly visual art, in which the design is generated by an algorithm. Algorithmic artists are sometimes called algorists. Algorithmic art is created in the form of digital paintings and sculptures, int ...

drawing Drawing is a Visual arts, visual art that uses an instrument to mark paper or another two-dimensional surface, or a digital representation of such. Traditionally, the instruments used to make a drawing include pencils, crayons, and ink pens, some ...

s, and

mixed media In visual art, mixed media describes work of art, artwork in which more than one Art medium, medium or material has been employed. Assemblages, collages, and sculpture are three common examples of art using different List of art media, media. M ...

. He co-founded the

Algorists Algorithmic art or algorithm art is art, mostly visual art, in which the design is generated by an algorithm. Algorithmic artists are sometimes called algorists. Algorithmic art is created in the form of digital paintings and sculptures, int ...

in 1995 with

Roman Verostko Roman Verostko (September 12, 1929 – June 1, 2024) was an American artist and educator who created code-generated imagery, known as algorithmic art. Verostko developed his own software for generating original art based on form ideas he had de ...

. From 2003 until his death, he held an

artist-in-residence Artist-in-residence (also Writer-in-residence), or artist residencies, encompass a wide spectrum of artistic programs that involve a collaboration between artists and hosting organisations, institutions, or communities. They are programs that pr ...

position at the

Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics The Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics (KITP) is a research institute of the University of California, Santa Barbara dedicated to theoretical physics. KITP is one of 20 Kavli Foundation (United_States)#The Kavli Institutes, Kavli Institutes ...

(KITP) at the

University of California, Santa Barbara The University of California, Santa Barbara (UC Santa Barbara or UCSB) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Santa Barbara County, California, United States. Tracing its roots back to 1891 as an ...

. Hébert was born in

Calais Calais ( , , traditionally , ) is a French port city in the Pas-de-Calais department, of which it is a subprefecture. Calais is the largest city in Pas-de-Calais. The population of the city proper is 67,544; that of the urban area is 144,6 ...

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

, and grew up in

Vence Vence (; ) is a commune set in the hills of the Alpes-Maritimes department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region in Southeastern France, north of Nice and Antibes on the Mediterranean coast. Ecclesiastical history The first known Bishop ...

. He worked for many years in the field of computer science even as he pursued his art. He eventually settled in

Santa Barbara, California Santa Barbara (, meaning ) is a coastal city in Santa Barbara County, California, of which it is also the county seat. Situated on a south-facing section of coastline, the longest such section on the West Coast of the United States excepting A ...

. He was a pioneer in the field of computer art from the mid-1970s on, merging traditional art media and techniques, personal software, plotters, and custom built devices to create an original body of work. He cited the American artist

Anni Albers Anni Albers (born Annelise Elsa Frieda Fleischmann; June 12, 1899 – May 9, 1994) was a German-Jewish visual artist and printmaker. A leading textile artist of the 20th century, she is credited with blurring the lines between traditional craft a ...

as an early inspiration and noted that he first read about her work in an

IBM International Business Machines Corporation (using the trademark IBM), nicknamed Big Blue, is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company headquartered in Armonk, New York, and present in over 175 countries. It is ...

brochure. He was the recipient of

Pollock-Krasner Foundation The Pollock-Krasner Foundation was established in 1985 for the purpose of providing funding to visual artists internationally to further their artistic practices. It was established at the bequest of Lee Krasner, who was an American abstract expr ...

and David Bermant Foundation awards. In 2012, he received the ACM SIGGRAPH Distinguished Artist Award for Lifetime Achievement in Digital Art.List of ACM SIGGRAPH Awards
/ref> Hébert produced works on paper, including ink and pencil drawings, paintings, etchings and dry points from polymer and copper plates, and digital prints. He also created sand, water and sound installations, algorithmic visual music, works for wall displays, physics based algorithmic pieces, and more. His work was exhibited extensively and was frequently juried in the

SIGGRAPH SIGGRAPH (Special Interest Group on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques) is an annual conference centered around computer graphics organized by ACM, starting in 1974 in Boulder, CO. The main conference has always been held in North ...

Art Gallery. Several museums and institutional collections hold his works, including the digital art collections of the

Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art The Block Museum of Art is a free public art museum located on the campus of Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. The Block Museum was established in 1980 when Chicago art collectors Mary (daughter of Albert Lasker) and Leigh B. Block ...

(Northwestern University, Chicago) and the

Victoria and Albert Museum The Victoria and Albert Museum (abbreviated V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.8 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and named after Queen ...

(London). The Art Vault of the Thoma Foundation in Santa Fe, New Mexico featured one of his works, "Circle of Squares" (1992) in its 2021 exhibition entitled, "Saint Somebody: Technologies of the Divine." In 2003, he became the artist in residence at the

(KITP) at the

(UCSB). He assumed this role at the invitation of the KITP's then-director and Nobel-prize-winning physicist,

David Gross David Jonathan Gross (; born February 19, 1941) is an American theoretical physicist and string theorist. Along with Frank Wilczek and David Politzer, he was awarded the 2004 Nobel Prize in Physics for their discovery of asymptotic freedom. ...

. At the KITP he organized several

group shows. These shows included Hans Dehlinger, Channa Horwitz,

(in 2006), Jean-François Colonna,

Helaman Ferguson Helaman Rolfe Pratt Ferguson (born 1940 in Salt Lake City, Utah) is an American sculptor and a digital artist, specifically an algorist. He is also well known for his development of the PSLQ algorithm, an integer relation detection algorithm. ...

Casey Reas Casey Edwin Barker Reas (born 1972), also known as C. E. B. Reas or Casey Reas, is an American artist whose conceptual, procedural and minimal artworks explore ideas through the contemporary lens of software. Reas is perhaps best known for having ...

(in 2008), and

David Em David Em (born 1952) is an American digital artist, known for his pioneering breakthroughs in computer art. He lives in Los Osos in San Luis Obispo County, California. Early life David Em was born in 1952 in Los Angeles, California. His fat ...

, Paul Hertz,

Robert Lang Robert Lang may refer to: *Robert Lang (ice hockey) (born 1970), Czech National Hockey League player *Robert Lang (cricketer) (1840–1908), cricketer *Robert Lang (cyclist) (1917–1997), Swiss cyclist *Robert Lang (rower) (born 1955), Australian ...

(in 2009) (in 2011). He died on March 28, 2021, at the age of 81.

References

Sources

* Lieser, Wolf (2009). ''Digital Art'': H. F. Ullmann Germany. . * Faure-Walker, James (2006). ''Painting the Digital River'': Prentice Hall. . * Santa Barbara Contemporary Arts Forum (2008). ''Drawing With the Mind'', Catalog. . * Spalter, Anne Morgan (1999). ''The Computer in the Visual Arts'': Addison Wesley. . * Varichon, Anne & Rocella, Carlo (2006). ''Etre Sable'': Editions du Seuil. . * Wands, Bruce (2006). ''Art of the Digital Age'', London: Thames & Hudson. .

External links

Jean-Pierre Hébert's personal site
* * * * *
Siggraph Art Gallery search for Hébert's references.
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Hebert, Jean-Pierre 1939 births 2021 deaths American digital artists American people of French descent French emigrants to the United States University of California, Santa Barbara faculty People from Calais