I find the product of the program quite fascinating, despite its lack of precision. It even tries to get shadows right, an exercise I myself have trouble with. It makes one think that to draw accurately (that is to mimic through a medium), one has to "see" like a computer. It is difficult to look at Marilyn and not see Marilyn, but that is what the program does. It "sees" only color values and pixels and is able to reproduce Marilyn's image exactly (by the duplicate() function). It takes practice and training for a person to simply follow a line, to see the trees and not the forest.

So then is this art? Certainly Robert Silvers' work is widely accepted as such. The imperfections of hand manipulated media are a part of what makes art human, and yet a child is a good "drawer" if he/she can accurately duplicate the likeness of a cartoon character or pony. Where does one goal stop and the other begin? Are Robert Silvers' mosaics art because a human has the final say in which tile goes where? If it is "left up to" the computer, is it meaningless? One could argue that the color evaluation/difference calculations used by the computer do not accurately reflect human perception and are therefore not true aesthetic choices. I say that whole movements of art have been based on non-standard perception.

"It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors." -- Oscar Wilde