Charles Csuri

The artist's estate

Charles Csuri: Beyond Boundaries Retrospective Exhibition (2006–2008)

ACM SIGGRAPH in Boston, the Urban Arts Space in Ohio, and the Kaohsiung Museum in Taiwan.

Pioneer Charles Csuri is known as “The Father of Digital Art and Computer Animation” (Smithsonian Magazine, 1995; ARTnews, 2022) and a “Master of the Digital Renaissance,” Karla Loring, The Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago. Csuri was a professor, fine artist, and computer scientist, whose research and artistic vision led to advances in software that created new tools for 3D computer graphics, computer animation, gaming, and 3D printing—well before these technologies saw widespread commercial use. Since the 1960s, Csuri experimented with the “real time” interactive art object, computer-based multimedia, milling machine sculpture, holograms, animation, and, more recently, NFTs. His art reflects the progress of the digital artistic movement and marks a unique historical milestone in the intersection of art and computer technology.

Csuri created digital art until the age of 99. He will be remembered as a true renaissance man: an athlete, war hero, professor, artist, and revolutionary innovator who merged art, science, and technology as one of the earliest, most prolific pioneers. Renowned worldwide as an influential educator and visionary, Csuri was a key figure in the art world’s embrace of technology as a transformative force, playing a historic role in the evolution of digital art.

Csuri’s artwork has been showcased in museums and held in private collections across five continents. Notable highlights include his work in the permanent collections of MoMA and the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, and exhibitions at MoMA, NYC; the Whitney Museum, NYC; the Pompidou, Paris; and LACMA, LA. Next month, his work will be featured at Tate Modern in London as part of the “Electric Dreams: Art and Technology Before the Internet” exhibition (2024–2025) and in the 2025 “The World Through AI” exhibition at Jeu de Paume in Paris.

In 19th Century Space Station Frame 0321, Charles Csuri creates generative art inspired by the science fiction writer Jules Verne. Part of Csuri’s Infinity Series, this work reflects his fascination with string theory and the "megaverse." Csuri created objects and then fragmented them in a diversity of particles, forces, and realities mirroring an explosion in space.

Csuri believed that some of the greatest works of art happen by accident, enjoying the element of surprise. His Infinity Series was about pushing the computer to its limits of complexity, achieving what could not be done by hand.

"Charles Csuri speaks of this Infinity Series as beginning in 1966 with his images Feeding Time and Random War, both shown in the 1968 Cybernetic Serendipity show in London, making these among the earliest computer-based generative artwork. Experiences working with randomness and chance led to Csuri’s increased realization of infinite artistic possibilities with the computer in the role of creative partner."

Dr. Matthew Lewis, ACCAD.

“ The computer offers an expanded universe with unique possibilities that enable me to shift away from the legacy of the picture plane. I find myself generating imagery that depends upon the unique capabilities of computer programming and mathematical procedures. Complexity as defined by thousands of objects within three-dimensional space became of great interest to me. Parameters are set according to an image in my mind, thousands of objects and fragments are randomly placed within the world space. From a distance, these pictures appear to be a textured rug but as the scale increases and you move further into a infinite space. Perhaps it becomes a journey into a universe, with the meaning changing, depending on ones position in space. I often ask myself if the world is falling apart or coming together again?”

Charles Csuri