Call for submissions: special issue of the journal Artificial Life, MIT Press.

This unique special issue connects the themes and methods of Artificial Life with the wider areas of art and creativity, and the field's implications for culture. It is an unusual but exciting step for a scientific journal to support a special issue of this nature. This certainly sits well with Artificial Life's interdisciplinary approach and provides a unique opportunity to draw together works that sit between the formally established disciplines.

The intention is for the special issue to be of broad and long-lasting appeal, not just to regular readers of the Artificial Life journal, but to readers engaging with other sciences, and with the arts and humanities.

Guest editor

Alan Dorin

Faculty of Information Technology,
Monash University,
Clayton, Australia. 3800

phone: +61-3-9905-3576
www.csse.monash.edu.au/~aland

Editorial assistant

Zoe Bukovac

Faculty of Information Technology,
Monash University,
Clayton, Australia. 3800

Topics covered by the special issue include but are not limited to:

• Art practice including visual art, music composition and performance, architecture, design, writing, interactive art, electronic media art, robotic art etc.
• Art theory including relationship of Artificial Life to Systems Art, Cybernetic Art, Art and Technology, Ecological Art, Algorithmic Art, Generative Art etc.
• Computational creativity
• Creativity of evolution and biology
• History and philosophy of science and technology
• Impact on the philosophy of art and creativity
• Nature, wilderness and environment
• Pop culture, science fiction

Important dates

Proposal final submission

Final submission for peer review

Author notification

Special issue publication

1 August 2013

1 October 2013

10 January 2014

TBC

Submissions connecting art and technical aspects of Artificial Life are also welcome. Potential topics include:

• Complexity
• Developmental models
• Ecology
• Emergence
• Evolution / reproduction
• Human-machine interaction
• Intelligent behaviour
• Self- organisation / assembly / production

Letters
Short communications detailing original research results, typically containing under 2,000 words. For this special issue, letters may contain descriptions of relevant, recent artworks or performances by the submitting authors, and visual material supporting the text. The aim here is to publish a collection documenting current exemplary Artificial Life art.

Articles
Manuscripts reporting original research containing on the order of 6,000 to 12,000 words. Articles may tackle practical issues, or they may articulate and argue a theoretical position. Articles take the form of a standard journal paper.

Reviews
Major overviews of domains of intellectual inquiry relevant to the subject of artificial life, art, creativity and culture. A review might tackle any relevant theme in detail.

Reports
Objective summaries of conferences, workshops, exhibitions, performances and other intellectual gatherings that would be of interest to the artificial life and art community, typically under 2,000 words.

Please submit a proposal prior to submitting an article or review.
Proposals do not need to be submitted prior to submission of a letter or report.

Proposals will be accepted for consideration anywhere up until the proposal final submission date, the earlier the better. A brief summary and outline consisting of no more than 2 pages, with supporting visual material if appropriate, should be sent directly to the guest editor by email.

The topic list provided above is not exhaustive. Authors with related ideas are encouraged to submit them to the guest editor for consideration.

Following initial approval in the case of articles or reviews, or without it in the case of letters and reports, authors may submit their manuscript directly to the guest editor by email at any time prior to the peer-review submission date. By submitting a manuscript, an author is warranting that it is substantially unique and not currently published or under review elsewhere.

All submitted manuscripts will be subject to editorial and peer-review in order to determine their suitability for the special issue and readiness for publication. If authors are successful, camera-ready papers and copyright forms prepared in accordance with MIT Press submission guidelines will be required.