
A Forgotten Moment in ASCII Art History - benbreen
http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2016/05/the-ascii-mystery-face/483698?single_page=true
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ktRolster
Even older, this one dates from the 1600s, it is a picture of some wings:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Easter_Wings#/media/File:Easte...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Easter_Wings#/media/File:Easter_Wings_1633.jpg)

And this one from the fourth century is an altar:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altar_poem#/media/File:Optatia...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altar_poem#/media/File:Optatianus_altar.JPG)

This one comes from 300BC:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simmias_of_Rhodes#/media/File:...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simmias_of_Rhodes#/media/File:Simmias_of_Rhodes_-
_Wings.jpg)

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kbutler
Differs from ASCII art in that they're (all?) constructed of single letters
repeated, and not always in a line, and not always complete letters. See the
first example - all Bs, with erased areas, and even some curved rows of Bs.

ASCII art uses various characters in precise typographical lines and ideally
uses the shapes of the various characters to represent the shape and shading
of the desired image.

~~~
dcacaac
It does qualify for me as ASCII art, since I often see the term used loosely
to encompass any art made from typographic characters.

I am a huge fan of these two experimental pieces from 'ASCII' artist Raquel
Meyers and chiptune/electronica musician Goto80:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y82QTBMBX4o](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y82QTBMBX4o)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=054vq9Sd8Ow](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=054vq9Sd8Ow)

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aab0
FWIW, I would have been more likely to click on this if instead of the
clickbaity title 'Solving a Century-Old Typographical Mystery', which makes me
expect to be disappointed or be something I've already ready (like the
typeface thrown into the Thames), it had a more informative title like
'Discovering ASCII Art in 1800s Newspapers and Why'.

(Where's dang when you actually need him to edit a submission title for
once...)

~~~
benbreen
Fair enough, I agree that the main title is pretty clickbait-y. Luckily there
was still time for me to edit the title myself to an excerpt from the subtitle
("a forgotten moment in ASCII art history").

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sjs382
Semi-related: an archive of the PC ASCII & ANSI art scene:
[https://artpacks.org](https://artpacks.org)

~~~
ktRolster
Wow, that website is great, it really makes me feel like I'm on a BBS in the
90s. While I'm surfing it, I can almost smell the antique hardware.

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apricot
See also French poet Guillaume Apollinaire's "Calligrammes", published in
1918:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calligrammes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calligrammes)

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smoyer
ASCII is a character encoding designed for computers. I wouldn't have been
picky about the author calling it ASCII art but he also says ASCII characters
in several places. So what should it be called? How about type art?

~~~
svachalek
The author calls it "typewriter art" but in the linked article it seems like
in its own time it was referred to as "artyping":

[http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/01/the-
lo...](http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/01/the-lost-
ancestors-of-ascii-art/283445/)

~~~
unexistance
awesome link, love the typewriter's instruction

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kevin_thibedeau
This is typewriter art which was a fad in the nineteenth century. The author's
persistence in calling it "ASCII" while mentioning typewriters only three
times in the article is laughable.

~~~
laumars
The article is aimed at a modern reader so uses modern terms. It's really no
different to how we have terms like "classic rock" and "oldskool" when back
then they were simply just "rock" and "house" music.

If people are not familiar with your subject then you have to use language
what _is_ familiar.

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sheepleherd
TL;DR pro-tip: to see the ASCII art in question, just scroll down, they are
surfaced in the article, not sequestered as links

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unexistance
in a way, [https://github.com/blitzcode/term-
gfx](https://github.com/blitzcode/term-gfx) & similar projects are a
continuity of these kind of art

I love it :D

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TelAviv_1
The misuse of the term ASCII bothers me.

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TazeTSchnitzel
Many decades before the word ASCII was defined, even.

~~~
wglb
Which came about in 1963, i reckon.

Makes one wonder why they don't call it EBCDIC art (just kidding) or BAUDOT
art.

This stunt was done for a long time before the invention of ASCII on RTTY
equipment as well.

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kazinator
The "American Standard Code for Information Interchange" is a digital
character set (mapping between numbers and glyps plus equipment control codes)
that was not invented and standardized until the 1960's.

It is quaint to call some 19th century artifact "ASCII text" (Perhaps,
"Monospaced type"?)

~~~
kazinator
All right, folks; they _had_ ASCII in the 19th century. Have it your way!

"There were no videos? Then what did you watch on MTV?" \-- Kelly Bundy,
_Married with Children_ TV Sitcom.

