SPECULATIVE EVOLUTION
Marc Lee & Shervin Saremi
This experiment is a speculative simulation of a future ecosystem. The narrative sets in a speculative farm, 30 years from now, where artificial intelligence and synthetic biology work together to create an optimized environment for farmed species. An AI agent helps the audience to generate new species to balance a delicate ecosystem.
Based on scientific publications on synthetic biology, genetic engineering and robotics, the artists envisioned how species could be further developed to increase their resilience and formulated text prompts to create AI-generated images using DALL-E. As a result, each speculative species in the environment has a backstory rooted in real-life scenarios: bees which lose the sense of orientation due to pesticides; snails that are displaced by invasive species; rice that is exposed to increasing drought and temperature.
Imagining a future where technologies like 3D printing, CRISPR, and synthetic biology play a part in modifying species for a higher chance of survival – genetically engineered super-bees with 3D-printed parts that restore their lost navigation skills; Hawaiian land snails with snake DNA to control the introduced snail invasion; genetically modified drought-tolerant and protein-rich rice.
Marc Lee (Switzerland) is creating network-oriented interactive art projects: interactive installations, media art, internet art, performance art, video art, augmented reality (AR) art, virtual reality (VR) art and mobile apps. He is experimenting with information and communication technologies and within his contemporary art practice, he reflects critically creative, cultural, social, ecological and political aspects. His artworks reflect the visions and limits of our social information in an intelligent and critical manner.
Shervin Saremi (Iran) is a musician and audio engineer who specializes in sonic computing, procedural sound design, and production. He has studied Electronic Production and Design at Berklee College of Music and is pursuing his research on immersive audio at Berlin University of the Arts (UdK).