A.L.A.M.O.

The article first recalls the historical evolution of computer poetry which, from Théo Lutz (1959) to alire (1989), evolves from experimentation to cultural entity. The emphasis is placed on the French evolution through its main expressions, which are the A.L.A.M.O., the first telematic review Art-Access the Les Immatériaux exhibition and the birth of L.A.I.R.E., a difference of viewpoints, of approaches and of the space given by the authors to computer poetry concerning the arts, the machine and the text. This progressive differentiation of focus questions approaches which were thought to be unchanging, regarding the notions of text, reader and author. This questioning started with the A.L.A.M.O. and progressed with L.A.I.R.E. Its description and the expression of the answers it proposes requires a new critical approach to the notion of text, more anchored in a communication pattern which has been developing since 1993 and whose present state is summed up in the third part. The article ends by demonstrating that the smooth running of alire is the full expression of what these new answers imply.

(Source: Visible Language website)

As an early programmer of digital poetry, theorist, active participant in various literary French movements, and co-founder of journals (alire) and groups (Transistoire Observable), Philippe Bootz outlines the gradual development of a coherent French aesthetic of digital poetry. His article circles around the paradigm of text generation and its different evolving movements which he describes and relates to each other in detail by giving account to the various actors, conditions, and conceptualizations behind the scenes of the communities he analyzes.

(Source: Author's abstract, Dichtung Digital)