data | code | system | sound | electronics | image | text | device

Hyperstition Bot (Or, An Evolutionary Machine Appropriating Human Culture)

By: Marinos Koutsomichalis
An experimental creative machine to be ‘plugged-in’ to human culture through the WWW and in order to produce own multimedia content autonomously and unattendedly. The machine employs natural language graphs, as well as intelligent Comprehenders that analyse the retrieved media to further the evolutionary cycle with new queries. It also features a series of algorithmic Composers that mashup and manipulate the retrieved media in various fashions. The overall system is being designed to empirically probe the hypothesis of genuine nonhuman creativity that is built computationaly upon the re-synthesis and the reappropriation of human culture (and through its WWW footprint).
data | code | system | sound | electronics | image | text | device

Hyperstition Bot (Or, An Evolutionary Machine Appropriating Human Culture)

An experimental creative machine to be ‘plugged-in’ to human culture through the WWW and in order to produce own multimedia content autonomously and unattendedly. The machine employs natural language graphs, as well as intelligent Comprehenders that analyse the retrieved media to further the evolutionary cycle with new queries. It also features a series of algorithmic Composers that mashup and manipulate the retrieved media in various fashions. The overall system is being designed to empirically probe the hypothesis of genuine nonhuman creativity that is built computationaly upon the re-synthesis and the reappropriation of human culture (and through its WWW footprint).

By: Marinos Koutsomichalis

Materials:
Concrete, aluminium, four single-board computers, network switcher, thermal printer, electronic circuitry, 3 screens, loudspeaker(s), bespoke software, computer-generated multimedia

Dimensions (bot):
30cm x 30cm x 30cm

Dimensions (installation):
variable, 3m x 3m x 2m minumum

Produced by:
Marinos Koutsomichalis

Produced at:
Norwegian Univ. of Science and Technology, Trondheim, NO
Media Arts & Design Research Lab, Limassol CY
Studio K, Heraklion GR
Solaris mobile studio, Nantes FR

Produced in:
2017-19

Documented by:
Marinos Koutsomichalis

‘Hyperstition Bot (Or, An Evolutionary Machine Appropriating Human Culture)’ consumes the web footprint of human culture, appropriates it, and produces own digital content in an unattended fashion and with respect to evolutionary algorithms, natural language processing/understanding, machine learning, machine listening/vision, and audio/video/3D-model synthesis. Crawling the WWW for media content of all sorts, it retrieves digital instances of human culture and (employing a series of intelligent comprehenders and synthesisers) it algorithmically generates (and projects onto space) multimedia artefacts of all sorts. In this way, it ever transfigures, re-synthesises, re-mediates, and re-appropriates human culture with respect to congenital cybernetic orderings so as to bring forth and to actualise a hybrid, multilingual, multi-religious, post-geographical, post-political, techno-magical, and ultimately ‘hyperstitional’ computational reality.

‘Hyperstition Bot (Or, An Evolutionary Machine Appropriating Human Culture)’ draws on a prior research  of the artist on a number of topics; most notably on ‘Evolvable Media Repositories’ (EMR) ecosystemic database management system, as well as on algorithmic audio mash-ups, imaginary soundscapes, and generative solid modelling. Imagery below and on the left present the EMR architecture and some sample natural language graphs. For a more detailed overview of the underlying software architecture and the various modules utilised, look at the following academic resources:

Koutsomichalis, M. (2021) A Hyperstitional Machine Appropriating Human Culture in an Evolutionary Fashion. In Proceedings of the International Conference on Computational Creativity: Workshop on Knowledge-Based Systems in Computational Design (Coimbra, PT / Online).

Koutsomichalis, M. & Gambäck Björn (2019). Evolvable Media Repositories: An Evolutionary System to Retrieve and Ever-Renovate Related Media Web Content. In Arai, K, Bhatia, R., Kapoor, S. (Eds) Intelligent Computing – Proceedings of the Computing Conference (London, UK) Volume 2, pp 76-92. New York, NY: Springer. DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-22868-2_6

Koutsomichalis, M. & Gambäck Björn (2018). Algorithmic Audio Mashups and Synthetic Soundscapes Employing Evolvable Media Repositories. In Proceedings of the 6th International Workshop on Musical Metacreation (Salamanca, ES).

Events
  • Publication, A Hyperstitional Machine Appropriating Human Culture in an Evolutionary Fashion, In Proceedings of the International Conference on Computational Creativity: Workshop on Knowledge-Based Systems in Computational Design. Coimbra, PT and Online. (2021)
  • Exhibition, Children of Prometheus Group Exhibition (curated by Furtherfield, London UK); NEME Arts Centre. Limassol, CY. (2019)
  • Publication, Koutsomichalis, M. & Gambäck, B., Evolvable Media Repositories: An Evolutionary System to Retrieve and Ever-Renovate Related Media Web Content, In Arai, K, Bhatia, R., Kapoor, S. (Eds) Intelligent Computing – Proceedings of the Computing Conference (London, UK) Volume 2, pp 76-92. New York, NY: Springer. (2019)