Falling Blue - Agnes Martin

Horizontal pencil lines perhaps half an inch apart are drawn to the edges of a border of bare canvas. In between the lines long horizontal strokes of dark blue are painted with a small brush from one side to the other. Each line starts, fades and continues as the brush ran out of paint and was then re-loaded. Whilst the painting exhibits minimalist attributes it hasn't been screen printed or otherwise mechanically produced. Each part has been meticulously painted or drawn. It reminded me of the engineering/craft debate in software. External observers view software as something constructed from hard edged parts. Graphical notations used emphasise the mechnistic nature through hard edge iconography. Compare that with the code itself, where each part has been individually crafted, each line tabbed in and placed in relation to the lines around it. In so many ways software felt like Falling Blue.