John F. Simon Jr.

John F. Simon Jr. was born in 1963 in Shreveport, Louisiana. He studied geology and fine art at Brown University, earning a BA and BS in 1985, then completed an MA in Earth and Planetary Science at Washington University in St. Louis in 1987. After a period working as a computer systems consultant, he earned an MFA in Computer Art from the School of Visual Arts in New York in 1989. He later established his art studio in Manhattan, where he continues to live and work.

Simon’s practice centers on using programming as a language for visual expression. He writes custom software that generates evolving compositions, treating code as a framework for drawing, color, and rhythm. His process often begins with sketches and algorithmic studies that translate gesture into structured, rule-based systems. He views the computer as a collaborator, using its capacity for calculation and duration to extend the act of drawing across time. Through works such as Every Icon, created in 1997, and ComplexCity, developed in 2000 and revisited in 2023, he explored how simple instructions can generate complex visual behavior and how systems evolve through iteration. Later works, including Unfolding Object and Channels, both from 2002, applied these ideas to interactive and multi-screen formats, where the software responds to viewers and runs continuously to reveal the passage of time.

Every Icon was exhibited in the Whitney Biennial in 2000, one of the first software-based works presented in that context. The project drew attention to Simon’s use of programming as an artistic medium and led to acquisitions by the Guggenheim Museum, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. He received the Aldrich Museum Trustee’s Award for an Outstanding Emerging Artist and went on to expand the visibility of digital and software-based art through major exhibitions worldwide.