ÂPEX ~ is a generative landscape art project responding to the conditions of the Anthropocene, where the lines between what is possible and what is only imagined are constantly shifting.  Simplified circles give way to hyperreal spaces. It is unclear if at any point they resemble a landscape that one could actually inhabit.

At what point do abstract shapes start to resemble believable environments? Each viewer may experience this work differently, depending on where they draw the line between realism and abstraction, natural form, reality and fantasy.

While landscape art is traditionally understood to represent natural forms, it has become increasingly difficult to distinguish between the natural and manufactured. When the code runs its course and a static picture emerges, a thin barrier seems to be crossed.

The work tests out the limits between reality and hyperrealism, between abstraction and surrealism, blurring distinctions between them.

Created by Ori Ben Shabat & Ronen Tanchum

APEX

The algorithm that was built for Getijde (Dutch for 'Tide') was meticulously designed. It's the result of spending most of the year cooped up inside four walls with a strong desire to escape. Countless hours were spent perfecting details to guarantee that each mint will be of high enough quality to be exhibited on screens and in print.

Getijde

An ode to Roy Lichtenstein, incorporating his iconic version of Ben-Day dots, halftone dots, angled stripes, and solid color patches. Inspired by Roy's sea and landscape paintings, each artwork generates a unique combination of patterns, shapes, and colors.

Ode to Roy

Pointila explores what happens when you combine the meticulous dots reminiscent of Pointillistic painting techniques with the channelled randomness of generative art, whilst also examining how subtle changes in parameters can paint similar forms in different styles.

Pointila is designed for display and interaction. Clicking on a live mint will trigger an animation loop between the primary and secondary palettes, click again to pause. Press 0, 1, 2, 3 or 4 on your keyboard to change glitch state. Press S to download a high resolution print.

Pointillism emerged from a collision of art and science in late 19th century French painting. Developed by Georges Seurat, his appeal to science, rigour and order built upon the broken brushstrokes of the Impressionists, as painting began to reckon with the emergence of the new technology of photography. Unbeknownst to Seurat, this response to one technology would foreshadow another – that of digital displays and pixels.

Rigour and order was manifest in the distinct dots of colour that give Pointillism its name. From a distance, the eye mixes these dots into vibrant, luminous scenes. This optical mixing bears a striking similarity to the way pixels work to display images on screen for us today.

“It’s done mechanically?” was a question posed at an 1894 Neo-Impressionist exhibition. The answer then was no. Pointila is both more and less mechanical than the Pointillist work that provoked the question. More, in that the hand of the artist has been replaced by the work of the computer – an extension of Seurat's efforts to remove the free hand of the artist. Yet less, with the ultimate position of each of the millions of dots decided randomly, unknown to the hand of the coder.

The Pointila algorithm first divides the canvas into columns. It then traverses the canvas dropping dots along those columns. From just a handful of layers, landscapes emerge. They take on a variety of forms: from rolling plains and steep canyons to jagged peaks and dreamy moors. Some are sharp and tense, others hazy and ethereal. They are coloured with handpicked palettes and animated with bold glitches – a nod to the shared optics of Pointillism and pixels.

Subtle changes in initial parameters give rise to similar landscapes painted in different styles. Faint echos, perhaps, of the different styles we see from Seurat in the numerous studies related to his masterpiece Un dimanche à la Grande Jatte.

Pointila

“𝙸 𝚊𝚖 𝚒𝚗𝚝𝚛𝚒𝚐𝚞𝚎𝚍 𝚠𝚒𝚝𝚑 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚜𝚑𝚊𝚙𝚎𝚜 𝚙𝚎𝚘𝚙𝚕𝚎 𝚌𝚑𝚘𝚘𝚜𝚎 𝚊𝚜 𝚝𝚑𝚎𝚒𝚛 𝚜𝚢𝚖𝚋𝚘𝚕𝚜 𝚝𝚘 𝚌𝚛𝚎𝚊𝚝𝚎 𝚕𝚊𝚗𝚐𝚞𝚊𝚐𝚎. 𝚃𝚑𝚎𝚛𝚎 𝚒𝚜 𝚠𝚒𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚗 𝚊𝚕𝚕 𝚏𝚘𝚛𝚖𝚜 𝚊 𝚋𝚊𝚜𝚒𝚌 𝚜𝚝𝚛𝚞𝚌𝚝𝚞𝚛𝚎, 𝚊𝚗 𝚒𝚗𝚍𝚒𝚌𝚊𝚝𝚒𝚘𝚗 𝚘𝚏 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚎𝚗𝚝𝚒𝚛𝚎 𝚘𝚋𝚓𝚎𝚌𝚝 𝚠𝚒𝚝𝚑 𝚊 𝚖𝚒𝚗𝚒𝚖𝚞𝚖 𝚘𝚏 𝚕𝚒𝚗𝚎𝚜, 𝚝𝚑𝚊𝚝 𝚋𝚎𝚌𝚘𝚖𝚎𝚜 𝚊 𝚜𝚢𝚖𝚋𝚘𝚕. 𝚃𝚑𝚒𝚜 𝚒𝚜 𝚌𝚘𝚖𝚖𝚘𝚗 𝚝𝚘 𝚊𝚕𝚕 𝚕𝚊𝚗𝚐𝚞𝚊𝚐𝚎𝚜, 𝚊𝚕𝚕 𝚙𝚎𝚘𝚙𝚕𝚎, 𝚊𝚕𝚕 𝚝𝚒𝚖𝚎𝚜.”

'Automatism' is inspired by the practice of artists where they are given a writing implement and a blank surface, and they go freestyle, almost mindlessly filling up the space with whatever comes to their minds and out of their hands. I've often wondered where a machine's mind and "hand" would wander given the same opportunity.

This project explores the age-old computer art phenomenon of inviting the viewer to actively participate in the interpretation of the visual output. The way "Sharp-E" draws the strokes is through a mix of various movements — irregular curves, straight lines, sudden changes in direction — in a classic random walk algorithm, while avoiding overlaps with previously drawn strokes. There are no pre-programmed forms per se, but nevertheless it can be common for the viewer to perceive images, symbols, meaning in the generated output.

So where does your mind wander? What forms, symbols, and meaning do you see?

Controls:
• 'D' toggles pausing/drawing or continues space-filling after the first stop (if available)
• 'R' reassembles the piece (This automatically happens every minute)
• 'S' saves the output

Automatism #68
Yazid

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Automatism #68.css-1wclmit{display:none;}@media (min-width: 768px){.css-1wclmit{display:inline;}} • .css-ymsk1t{white-space:nowrap;font-weight:400;}Yazid

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Automatism #68
Yazid