ABSTRACT Drapely-o-lightment is a skirt created as an exploration of the integration of electronics and clothing. This prototype was made as a tool for research into design techniques that work well with components that conform to today’s standards for the manufacturing of electronics. The design takes into account not only the inclusion of squares in the visual design but also the tactile and visual properties of hard components in a traditionally soft medium. The fabric colors were chosen based on the OLED light effects. The skirt is the result of a collaboration between hightech fashion, corporate electronics and academic industrial design.

The article discusses a novel way of looking at Mondrian's nonfigurative paintings. Different periods of Mondrian's life correspond to distinct types of nonfigurative compositions, but can the distinction be formalized? How many bits or numbers are needed to characterize a typical composition? Can the rules of a composition type be expressed in the language of the computer? If distinct composition types require different computer programs, can these be based on a common frame-work, a mechanism, perhaps? The findings presented here are only tentative, but it is interesting to note that some characteristics can be modeled reasonably well, whereas others still resist formalization in the presented framework. The author's approach borrows principles from genetic programming. Employing a built-in random number generator, it can be used to explore a large space of “compositions.”