GB: In the 1960s there was an international computer art movement with the New Tendencies in Zagreb and the extensive exhibition Cybernetic Serendipity at the ICA in London in 1968. Was there any awareness for this rather marginal movement at that time? Were there any connections to, for example, the ZERO or the Op-Art movement?

GJ: We were active participants of these movements. We contributed with lectures and publications as well as presentation of our artworks in exhibitions. So for example, Gravenhorst and myself were exhibiting in Zagreb, and we also took part at the symposium. Kage and Breier were both part of the ZERO group. Nevertheless, the art establishment didn't truly take notice.

Regarding the acknowledgement of our work (generative photography) as a legitimate form of art, we had to fight on two levels against the perception of "photography as illegitimate art" (Bourdieu, 1983). It was only in 1984 when photographs were being accepted legally as works of visual art according to German copyright law. On the other hand there was a general skepticism whether computers could be regarded as an artistic medium. The rather cold outputs of computer art couldn't withhold the traditional conception of high art. So as photographers, we were basically not regarded as real artists, and as generative photographers, we were not regarded as real photographers.

GB: Was there a market for computer art? Who were the collectors and gallerists dealing with that type of art?

GJ: In the 1960s, there didn't exist a significant market for generative art. For photography it was Käthe Schroeder who opened Galerie Clarissa, the first gallery for photography in Germany. This gallery also specialized in experimental and generative art. When she donated her collection to the Kestner Museum in Hannover in 1968, the list of included artists was almost an encyclopedia of the avantgarde movement in photography in the 1960s. Among the artists were Théodore Bally, Monika von Boch, Hein Gravenhorst, Heinz Hajek-Halke, Roger Humbert, Manfred Kage, Gottfried and Ursel Jäger, René Mächler, Floris Neusüss, Heinrich Riebesehl - just to name a few.

GB: In the exhibition "Automat und Mensch," we are presenting a series of your pinhole structures from 1967. Each artwork is titled with a code such as, for example, 3.8.14 D 3.1. Can you describe the underlying method and idea behind this series and how you developed your concept of pinhole structures further at the dawn of the digital age?

GJ: The first so-called "Lochblendenstruktur" (pinhole structure) was conceived on the light table where I was experimenting with transparent superimposed slides containing patterns and dot matrices. The results were peculiar geometric patterns and shapes which I have further developed by using optical devices.