Behaviourist Art and Cybernetics Mapping a Field

Drawing together key areas of cybernetic art practice in the UK and USA, this book assesses British and American cybernetic art as relating to the intersecting field of Behaviourism.
This study takes as a starting point Roy Ascott's essay 'Behaviourist Art and the Cybernetic Vision' (1966) and uses it to define a field of Behaviourist art from the period 1945-1975. Kate Sloan establishes the role of the cybernetic concept of feedback as a defining factor in understanding works of art as behavioural, expanded well beyond the perimeters of what we consider cybernetic art. The book also demonstrates how light, as a behavioural trigger, informed several discrete areas of art making, from cybernetic art to countercultural light shows and behaviourist architectures.
The book will be of interest to scholars working in art history, technology studies, music history, architectural history, and design history.

About the author

Kate Sloan holds a lectureship in Modern and Contemporary Art History at the University of Edinburgh.

Product details

• Authors: Sloan Kate, Kate (University of Edinburgh Sloan, Kate Sloan
• Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd.
• Content: Book
• Product form: Hardback
• Publication date: 29.09.2025
• Subject: Humanities, art, music > Art > Art history
• EAN: 9781032612317
• ISBN: 978-1-0-3261231-7
• Pages: 202
• Series: Routledge Advances in Art and Visual Studies
• Subjects: History, Sociology, The arts: general issues, ART / History / General, Philosophy, ART / Conceptual, History of art / art & design styles, History of Art, History of Science, Industrial / commercial art & design, History of Architecture, Civil engineering, surveying & building, Art forms, Design, Industrial and commercial arts, illustration, The Arts: art forms, Civil engineering, surveying and building, The arts: general topics, ART / History / 20th & 21st Century, operant conditioning, interactive installations, cybernetic feedback in visual arts, architectural behavior studies, systems theory in art, light-based environments