This exhibition borrows its name from Willliam Gibsons first published short story, Fragments of a Hologram Rose. As the story notes, when a hologram is cut into pieces, even the smallest section still contains the whole of the image. In a similar way, plant cuttings and an edition of digital works can both hold these mirroring elements of origin and multiplicity. The artists featured in the exhibition were asked to imagine and create their own sci-fi plants. Like botanists from a parallel future, these artists cultivated their fictions into existence. They sub-scattered seed pods, pruned polygon cuttings, gave their models plenty of volumetric lighting, and soaked them in fluid simulations. The 3D objects in this exhibition have secret pathways and telepathic tendrils. They bloom on neon skins and disperse nano mold spores through LCD screens. Like an ikebana of poisonous flowers in zero gravity, they hover in the expanse as a collection of fragmented flora files. Rick Silva

Feral File  Fragments of a Hologram Rose

&ldquo;Mutant Bagua&rdquo; is a 3D sculptural reinterpretation of the Taoist Bagua () as a machine-spirit interface. In the center lies the Chinese mythical pearl of knowledge engraved with the Five Elements, adorned with the Taoist talisman for &ldquo;Opening of the Heart.&rdquo; Enshrining the pearl are the eight trigrams of the Bagua, each representing a principle of reality translated into computational binary code: yin vs yang, 0 or 1. This sculptural digitization of ancestral code reinvents the form as a hybrid mutant sci-fi abstraction suggestive of queer robotics, drones, and imagined extraterrestrial technology.

By uploading ancient Taoist script into virtual form, &ldquo;Mutant Bagua&rdquo; serves as an ancestral portal to digital spirits that haunt the interface between Taoist structural code and digital data. As professor Alvin Eng Hui Lim states in his book Digital Spirits in Religion &amp; Media, &ldquo;Trigrams produce networks, simply by operating as nodes where gods pass their visions and energies to human subjects with the right access codes... Gods are only accessible when human agents enact the trigrams and numbers and use them as codes and passwords to tap into the divine sphere.&rdquo; Through numbers, the god in the machine speaks.

&ldquo;Mutant Bagua&rdquo; presents an opportunity to reimagine the Taoist binary&mdash;thinking of yin and yang not as fixed gendered arrival points, but as vectors in motion: data storage in flux that when combined can reveal an infinite spectrum of possibilities. Or, as Laozi riffed over 2000 years ago:

&ldquo;Tao produced the One.
The One produced the Two.
The Two produced the Three.
And the Three produced the Ten Thousand things.&rdquo;
&mdash;Laozi, Tao Te Ching

Mutant Bagua #33

Working with AI art sometimes feels like gazing into a pond of water. In a still pond, we see a clear, gently blurred version of ourselves staring back at us, while turbulent waters return rippled echoes of our shape. These changing reflections of ourselves are similar to images generated from data, which can be hyperrealistic depictions of the original, or images that are surreal and barely recognizable, as errors creep in. This exhibition looks at the way artists represent nature and humans, using the latest machine learning technologies to conjure seascapes, imaginary marine creatures, autumn leaves, and musings on the human form. Masks and faces akin to the grotesque rear their heads, reminding us of the early errors of these technologies and the eternal human fascination with depicting ourselves. These artists present AI as a tool to craft new reflections on perennial subjects, as well as a creative partner, conjuring new landscapes, creatures, and forms. Luba Elliott

Feral File  Reflections in the Water

&ldquo;Leaves of Manifold, of Red and Gold&rdquo; by Helena Sarin is a piece that focuses on autumn tree leaves, the rich combinations of their color hues, and their seasonal omnipresence. Leaves appear and disappear one by one, presenting a fashion parade to the viewer, the detailed veins and complex color transitions providing a feast for the visual senses. At times the shapes seem to belong to unfamiliar trees, or the leaf stalk may be separated. As is typical in Helena Sarin&rsquo;s practice, these images have been generated by a GAN trained on the artist&rsquo;s own photographs and sketches. Then, Sarin reviews the generated images and manually curates the final selection, acting by the principle &ldquo;It&rsquo;s not the frames you play, it&rsquo;s the frames you don&rsquo;t play,&rdquo; to paraphrase Miles Davis.

Leaves of Manifold, of Red and Gold #85

The Bardo: Unpacking the Real is an exhibition that quantifies the ephemeral as it relates to the liminal landscape of sculptural art in the digital age. The exhibition examines the real and (un)real in digital sculpture; questions what it means to view and collect digital sculptures; and investigates the role of NFTs in the creation of the featured artists' work. Named after an afterlife concept in the The Tibetan Book of the Dead, The Bardo explores the possibilities of what sculpture can be, and how it can be viewed. The exhibition takes the idea of a sculpture to the next level by reinventing how sculpture can be seen and collected, and featuring different innovations around the notion of ownership. The Bardo: Unpacking the Real exemplifies the creativity, enthusiasm, and energy (both human and electromagnetic) that reflects this historic time in art history. Julie Walsh

Feral File  The Bardo: Unpacking the Real

Carla Gannis&rsquo;s &ldquo;peep-o-rama&rdquo; playfully examines what it has meant to gaze at a sculpture throughout the canon of art history. Inspired by one of Gannis&rsquo; vivid dreams, the piece was further informed by the Samuel van Hoogstraten (1627-1678) peep box show at the National Gallery in London. To create the colors and forms in the peep box backgrounds, she trained an AI using images from Times Square pornographic peepshows (for the colors) and images from Dutch painting (for the forms). Once a collector purchases Gannis&rsquo; work, the mystery of the peep box&rsquo;s contents is revealed through a variety of unique experiences, including a view modeled after one of Hoogstraten&rsquo;s works, a single-person VR view (which allows you to visit the inside the peep box itself), and a social VR version where you can hang out with your friends in a space-age bachelorette pad. The peep box sculpture addresses such serious topics as gender and body politics in art history, the idea of public and private ownership of data, and how technology challenges the very notion of seeing.

peep-o-rama #3

Nancy Baker Cahill's mutant artwork &ldquo;Stipstream 001&rdquo; takes inspiration from the literary genre known as slipstream fiction, which deals with &ldquo;the familiar strange or the strange familiar.&rdquo; The digital sculpture is based on an IRL sculpture made of torn graphite drawings that were recombined and translated into a 3D object that resembles a simulated botanical form. This process of making and destroying-or of altering the translation of the representational state of the artwork-is a multi-layered, ongoing part of Baker Cahill's artistic practice. The work contains additional layers of reality that are only revealed once the work is collected.

Slipstream 001 #3

What happens to the human body when it is digitized and transmitted into other spaces? That is the question Sophie Kahn has been asking for years, as she's experimented with scanning bodies in order to create 3D printed sculpture. In particular, Kahn has been fascinated by what the 3D scanner leaves out in the process of recording a model's body. Kahn intentionally misuses a 3D laser scanner to generate fragmented forms. &ldquo;Spectrality (from The Divers, IX)&rdquo; grapples with the concept of virtual sculpture, and takes inspiration from Victorian spirit photography. With its mixture of eeriness and obvious simulation, the piece takes the form of a digital ghost. In a browser, the artwork can be viewed in 360 degrees; it can also be viewed in augmented reality within the viewer's own space. Either way, it is best seen in a dark room, at night, when it glows softly. Her figures are suspended in a sort of digital purgatory, caught between life (the physical world) and death (the internet).

Spectrality (from The Divers, IX) #3

For Your Eyes Only aims to stimulate a conversation with contemporary artists about the future of human visual culture, and to investigate how they are working, in different ways, on the development of a visual language capable to resist machine vision and its implications, and to improve human visual communicationa post-AI, posthuman human vision. The exhibition includes images of diverse nature and origin, submitted as answers to questions of how humans will continue to see and understand images differently than machines do. The images in this exhibition can be used like answers, but they are rather proofs. They have been sent by a human to another human, each of them carrying much more than what I asked for. They are not delivering an answer, they are the answer. Try to read them, and youll soon find out that they have as many readings as readers. Enjoy, theyre for your eyes only. Domenico Quaranta

Feral File  For Your Eyes Only

Like the webcam videos Cortright has been working on since 2007, smoking-vase-1 was filmed with no post production, just live use of standard webcam software. Similar to Instagram or Snapchat videos, the effects are part of the original recording, but by contrast, smoking-vase-1 is not part of a networked system designed for data mining and facial recognition. The looping animation is slow, simple, and with a focus on beauty, which led Cortright to her choice of subject as well as the obsolete filter. To shoot smoking-vase-1, Cortright used an old 2014 Mac OS, which gives the image a vintage flavor. A favorite subject of her digital paintings, flowers are featured here as a fragile metaphor of time passing, of a relationship between the real and digital sphere that is ever evolving, never the same.

smoking-vase-1 #87

Created as a talisman to help us refocus on what matters most in our lives, Auriea Harvey&rsquo;s &ldquo;The Mystery [v5-dv1]&rdquo; is a digital sculpture that also serves as a memento mori-a type of still-life from Western art history that is a reminder of both beauty and death. The discrete images that make up &ldquo;The Mystery [v5-dv1]&rdquo; can be seen as symbolic; for example a skull (bone), a face (nature), a rose (beauty), and a braid (death). The composite image of the sculpture rotates in a timeless way, as if it is waiting for the viewer to &ldquo;use&rdquo; the object (which may be digitally printed by the collector) to give it a new life. Multiple file formats also allow the collector to make use of the sculpture in the ways that feel most meaningful to them. Harvey&rsquo;s work is a self-portrait; she has used her own face as a basis for the sculpture, thereby inserting the face of an African-American woman into the art historical narrative and creating new allegories with this refiguration, thus updating sculpture both digitally and socially.

The Mystery [v5-dv1]  AP

In ancient Persian literature,    (Moon-faced) was a genderless adjective used to define beauty in both men and women. In contemporary Iran, it refers to the beauty of women only. Something similar happened, in the world of images, to the Qajar dynasty portrait paintings: the modernization of Iran, the influence of the European tradition of realistic painting, and the use of of camera technology and therefore photography as a model, overshadowed and ended the queer representation of genders that historically characterized these paintings, largely known for their gender-undifferentiation. For her project,   Moon-faced, Allahyari uses a carefully researched and chosen series of keywords with a multimodal AI model to generate a series of videos from the Qajar Dynasty painting archive (1786-1925). Through this collaboration, the machine program learns to paint new genderless portraits, in the effort to undo and repair a history of Westernization that ended the course of nonbinary gender representation in the Persian visual culture. The music in this video was composed by Mani Nilchiani.

  Moon-faced #103

Augury by LoVid

Augury is a festive collection ranging from vast sorbet-colored landscapes to dense pattern iterations.
 
Augury remixes frames from LoVids red, green, and blue (RGB) luminous moving image work. For over two decades, LoVid has been making audiovisual works using custom-built handmade analog video (and audio) synthesizers. In addition to moving-image media, LoVids outputs capture stills (frames) from generative video and incorporate these into digital collages, textile designs, wearable works, prints, and more. An essential part of LoVids process involves translating signals and experiences from one medium into another. This conversion/interoperability appears critical for living in an interdisciplinary, intermedia, intersectional mixed-reality world.

With Augury, LoVid continues exploring on-chain processes that are inspired by the mechanism and aesthetic of analog synthesis.This collection builds upon LoVids first analog video synthesizer-inspired collection: Tide Predictor. Each output in Augury grabs frames from the Tide Predictor algorithm (using a unique new hash) and arranges them on the screen based on a set of instructions, possibilities, and limitations.  The generative compositions in Augury are therefore both procedurally related to and visually reminiscent of quilting, tapestry pattern designs, and tactile weaving. They use visual elements that LoVid often employs in static works: mirroring and repetitive looping, abrupt changes in intensity and detail, overlapping recycled patterns, and a colliding playful mix of lines and signals buzzing in different directions. 

The rules applied in Augury are primarily set around placing variable levels of density on the borders, the edges of the work, creating a sense of dynamic movement and discovery. Focusing the viewers gaze outside the center encourages shifts in perspectives, literally and symbolically. Augury is inspired both by the ideas and aesthetics in the Pattern and Decoration (P&D) movement and Glitch art. 

P&D emerged in the 1970s as a response and challenge to a predominantly white male aesthetic that dominated the artworld and historically marginalized art forms and practices of women and people of color. P&D took a feminist approach by shifting the conversation around crafts and decorative arts, placing them on an equal canonic level with western-style paintings. Augury expands this conversation to generative art and challenges hierarchies and relationships to status, economy, and desire. 

Glitch art refers to artifacts that were created by machine error, intentionally or by chance. Glitch as an art form originally emerged as a response to and celebration of loss in signals fleeting artifacts that momentarily offer a glimpse into the inner workings and complexities of storage, display, and communication technology (Iman Moradi, 2009). In Augury, LoVid incorporates a color palette, textures, and shapes inspired by both digital glitches and inherently unstable analog outputs. Aesthetically and viscerally, Augury finds beauty in discarded marginal dysfunctionality. 

This collections title, Augury, refers to the practice of interpreting omens/predicting the future based on the behavior of birds. Complex systems and environmental signals inspire and require attention. LoVids Augury harnesses and embraces this chaos, the turbulent flow of data, to bring you a sweet and colorful feast for the eyes, food for thought and beyond!

Augury #86

Mantras for Artists

Mantra #21

p1xelfool - 4C-SKAN

p1xelfool is a Brazilian artist who explores the perception of time and phenomena with the medium as a mediator. His interest in conversations between machines and humans drives questions about the limits of organic and synthetic entities, and uses that unsettlement as a starting point to build works around those questions.

p1xelfool - 4C-SKAN 55/1537

Welcome to Digital Paint, an interactive audio-visual collection of 5,000 unique NFTs. 

Designed and conceptualized by artist Jen Stark, in collaboration with Chain/Saw and CutMod, Digital Paint's generative canvas allows collectors to explore and create their own animated, living masterpieces. Inspired by mandalas, sacred geometry, and color theory, the Digital Paint collection features a myriad of pulsating patterns and sound activating brushstrokes. 

The psychedelic world of Digital Paint is filled with surprises. In a celebration of shared joy and communal experience, each minted artwork is built upon layers of time-based coding, tied to an infinite loop of playful transformations that slowly reveal themselves throughout the calendar year. 

Digital Paint

Digital Paint is a collection of 5,000 NFTS created by Los Angeles-based artist Jen Stark, in collaboration with CutMod, Chain/Saw, and you. Each Digital Paint NFT contains a dynamic, ever-evolving interactive world of color that beckons collectors to play with unique brush shapes, psychedelic palettes, and undulating patterns.

Digital Paint #508

The NFT Yearbook Mintpass

The NFT Yearbook Mintpass 
 A project brought to you by **Metaverse Publishing**, The NFT Yearbook is aimed at showcasing, celebrating, and recording the Year in NFTs for future Generations  
  The NFT Yearbook will be a true collectible in both the digital and real world with a beautiful high quality 420-page coffee table book as well as an Interactive Digital NFT Book 
 This Mintpass assigns to its owner the rights to mint one free NFT Yearbook NFT and claim the Physical copy of the NFT Yearbook that goes with it as well as any additional utilities that come with it.  
 Holders of Mintpasses will be given priority access on Mint day and will also be given additional Whitelist Access to mint extra copies should they wish. 
 The NFT Yearbook Mintpass NFT affords early access to the first ever NFT Yearbook, a project by **Metaverse Publishing.** 
 www.metaversepublishing.io

The NFT Yearbook Mintpass #177

The Decagon is the infinitely evolving, always unique, and eternally open membership token of the Decaverse. Designed by Kjetil Golid.

Decagon

Decagon #43468

TRYST

TRYST explores the moments and the non-moments, the loves, the losses, and the in-between that make up the lives of the people of Brooklyn. A set of three lyrical and arresting short stories, TRYST offers a glimpse into the poetic and expansive inner lives of the people we walk past every day.

Offered as a collection of 100, each edition comes with an original cover by artist Alexandria Sofija. 

REFRACT PASS

The REFRACT Pass will act as the main point of access to RefractionDAO. It is an evolving NFT that will offer long-term, expanded utilities for our members.The Pass was created by Refraction using our generative art app, Generate. 1000 editions will be available, each with a unique gradient design.

Refract Pass #56

CENTURY 2052 by Casey REAS

This artwork will die on 20 October 2052.

Today Im 50.
Will I live to be 80?
Will I outlive this artwork?
Will this artwork outlive me?

The original CENTURY project is autobiographical. Creating art and experiencing art is the core of my life, and CENTURY is my homage to 20th Century artists. Its a synthesis of their ideas.

CENTURY 2052 brings the endeavor to the 21st Century. Its released as 50 unique artworks, one for each year since I was born. The artwork transitions from life to death at 6:44pm EST on October 20th 2052.

This isn"t a commercial or public release. Its a gift to others who have shaped the world of art that I inhabit.

CENTURY 2052 #19

Sothebys is pleased to present, Sebastio Salgado: Amaznia, the debut NFT collection from one of the worlds most celebrated living photographers. Brilliantly conceived and masterfully crafted over the course of five months, Amaznia is composed of a collection of 5,000 unique photographs and Tree of Life, an original short video film with original audio as a 1/1. The collection spans more than a decade of Salgados visits through the Amazon. Among the 5,000 photographs there are 10 categories coupled with numerous traits representing the location, region, and villages Sebastio Salgado immortalized through these journeys. 

Amaznia is both a love letter to and a call to action to support the extraordinary beauty of the region's rainforest, rivers, mountains, and people. Primary sale and secondary royalties' proceeds are to benefit Institut Terra, a non-profit organization cofounded in 1998 by Sebastio Salgado and Llia Deluiz Wanick Salgado.

Amazonia - Sebastiao Salgado

For centuries after Portugal colonized Brazil, the Amazon rainforest was nicknamed the Green Hell, an impenetrable rain-sodden jungle that offered only danger to outsiders. Many expeditions, above all those hoping to find gold in the mythical lost city of El Dorado, never returned. Some may have been killed by hostile native tribes or died of snake bites or starvation, but a surprisingly large number of explorers chose to settle down with indigenous tribes and share their bucolic way of life. Today, the rainforest is viewed more benignly, sometimes even romantically, as the Green Paradise, more often simply as an extraordinary treasure of nature, one with the planet"s largest concentration of botanical species, including some 16,000 species of trees and innumerable plants with remarkable medicinal potential. Further, this unparalleled concentration of vegetation absorbs greenhouse gases and breathes out oxygen. It also offers a traditionally secure home to hundreds of indigenous tribes, some of whom have never had contact with the outside world.