Code as Creative Medium: A Handbook for Computational Art and Design

Code as Creative Medium is a digital handbook for computational art and design. This PDF edition offers instant download access to a thoughtfully curated collection of teaching materials. It is designed for educators, students, and self-learners alike.

Written by Golan Levin and Tega Brain, the book brings together assignments, exercises, and interviews from the creative coding community. It focuses on ideas and visual outcomes rather than language-specific syntax.

Book Overview

Code as Creative Medium presents a language-agnostic approach to learning and teaching code in the visual arts. The book is organized into three main parts: assignments, exercises, and interviews. Topics include generative landscapes, face generators, data self-portraits, drawing machines, bots, creative cryptography, and machine learning.

The handbook is designed to support instructors building creative coding courses, workshops, or modules. Its material draws on decades of classroom practice from a broad network of artists, designers, and technologists.

What You’ll Discover Inside

• A structured set of assignments, from iterative pattern and face generator to synesthetic instrument and virtual public sculpture.
• Short exercises that introduce computational concepts through creative problem-solving.
• Interviews with educators about teaching programming to artists and designers.
• Topics including color, geometry, simulation, machine learning, sound, and games.
• A language-agnostic design that avoids tying the material to a single programming language.
• Guidance for building curricula, weekend workshops, high school modules, or certificate programs.

Why This Book Matters

As computation becomes more central to art and design education, Code as Creative Medium offers a durable reference for instructors. It collects teaching methods that are often shared informally and rarely preserved in print. The foreword by Casey Reas places the book in conversation with earlier efforts to document experimental art pedagogy.

The project was supported by the National Endowment for the Arts and developed with assistance from Carnegie Mellon University and NYU Tandon School of Engineering. It serves as a practical resource for a rapidly evolving field.

Book Details

Device Compatibility

This is a digital download. No physical copy will be shipped, and access is available immediately after purchase. The PDF can be read with Kindle apps, tablets, desktop readers, mobile devices, and most modern reading applications.

FAQ

How soon will I receive the book?The download link appears right after purchase.

Will I receive a physical copy?No. This listing is for a digital PDF only.

Which devices are supported?The file works with most tablets, desktop readers, and mobile reading apps.

Add Code as Creative Medium to your collection and explore a practical handbook for computational art and design.

Verified Bibliographic Details