Four Tech Answers
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Here's my contribution to the "Four Questions: Tech" theme
currently making the rounds. I heard about it from Anna's
phlog [1], who heard about it from Ben Collver. But no one
tagged me, I'm just elbowing my way in.
1. When did you first get interested in technology?
Before I got interested in computers, I was what you
might call a "painting geek." I don't know what they're
teaching in art school these days, but back then they'd
just show you a bunch of examples of different kinds of
painting and let you figure out what you wanted to do and
how to make it, and then critique the heck out of your
floundering attempts. My teachers really frowned on the
idea of teaching classical painting technique, fearing it
would lead us innocent souls away from developing our own
unique style or artistic statement. Also, most of my
teachers had themselves been taught according to those
principles, so they didn't really know much about
classical technique to begin with. This approach never
really worked for me, so eventually I thought I'd try
teaching myself technique from books, starting with Ralph
Mayer's classic "The Painters Handbook of Materials and
Techniques (4th edition)," a 730 page tome which I
basically had memorized at one point. I studied what you
might call the "kitchen chemistry" of painting, learning
all about the different pigments and their various
properties; how to make a proper painting medium with
damar varnish, stand oil, and turpentine; how to properly
stretch a (linen) canvas with rabbit skin glue, carpet
tacks, and a lead-based primer; and on and on. It didn't
make me into a great painter, but it did make me a better
painter, and it was interesting and a lot of fun.
One thing I remember was how, even 35 years ago, it was
getting harder and harder to find all the things you'd
need to paint in a traditional way. Some of the pigments
beloved of earlier generations were either unobtainable
or incredibly expensive, and so had been replaced by more
modern synthetic equivalents that didn't behave quite the
same. It was surprising to learn that even very
traditional technologies like oil painting were still
evolving.
2. What's your favourite technology?
I think agriculture was a great idea.
3. What's your current favourite?
Two early loves that have lasted to the present day:
print books (in my day, you whipper snappers, we just
called them "books") and my bicycle.
4. Name cool tech we'll have in 25 years!
As the saying goes, it's hard to make predictions,
especially about the future. I'd love to see the advent
of practical, liveable buildings grown from living trees,
as envisioned in Rebecca Campbell's "Arboreality."
References
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[1] agk's diary
gopher://sdf.org:70/0/users/agk/2025-04-16-4q.txt
Sun Apr 20 16:17:51 PDT 2025
