Grace C. Hertlein began to work as an artist in the mid 1940s, showing her work in individual exhibitions from 1959. As a friend of the chief editor and co-publisher of the magazine Computers and Automation, she played a decisive part in the concept for the Computer Art Contest, the winner of which was presented on the cover of each year’s August edition.

When teaching, she introduced IT specialists to Computer Art, while also making artists aware of computer programmes. Hertlein regards this interdisciplinary approach as extremely productive, but she found it difficult to realise initially, in face of opposition.

“I am an interdisciplinary person, who might have taught in an English, Art or a Philosophy Department. I was, after all, not a pure scientist – merely an artist with the ability to write and speak, to philosophize.”

" The teaching of computer art is a bridge that unites ‘Art and Science’.Art Departments find the subject too technical. Computer departments find the area too artistic. "

In her late years, Hertlein continued to write philosophical poetry, and composing computer music (since 2004).

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