Wed, 11 Jul 2007 12:00am

Book | Linked

As part of my summer holidays I went over to General Toshevo in Bulgaria. My house there is now quite habitable (after a couple of years of stop-start renovations!) and it's a good place to unwind and get through my book pile.

My main topic of reading on this trip was the book 'Linked' by Albert-Laszlo Barabasi. This is both an introduction to network theory and the fascinating story of how the author's research in to the subject has progressed over the years.

An awareness of the networks and interconnected systems around us - both in nature and in the human world - is a key element of my digital arts work and this book reinforces this world view. Barabasi's book also shows that different types of networks often contain similar features and topologies. Again, this is something I have been looking to explore in my creative work.

As well as 'Linked', I also started to read 'The Prehistory of the Mind' by Steven Mithen. This is an attempt to understand how the human mind has evolved and when those things we regard as particularly human, such as art and language, first emerged. So far so good, but I didn't get to finish it. Hopefully I'll still be able to find time to do some reading now that I'm back...

Author: Sean Clark