Machine Hallucinations : Coral emerges from Refik Anadol Studio’s ongoing research project on data aesthetics based on collective visual memories of nature. For this unique, site-specific data sculpture designed for Art Basel Miami 2021, in collaboration with Aorist Art and Faena Hotel Miami Beach, and displayed on Miami Beach, Anadol and his team collected 35,742,772 images of coral from publicly available social media platforms and processed them with machine learning classification models.

As the machine-mind begins to make its own connections between data points and “hallucinate” about alternative coral shapes and colors, the data universe expands into a latent cosmos in which fluid dynamics becomes the main inspiration of Anadol’s artistic creativity. Connecting a digital ecosystem of data and a landscape that is home to many living ecosystems, the artwork focuses on preservation and sustainability. Of the work, Washington Post’s Pulitzer Prize-winning art critic Sebastian Smee wrote, “I loved it… Anadol’s work — visually stunning, intelligent, mesmerizing — amazed and moved me.”

Deeply thankful for their kind supports; Aorist, Faena, City of Miami and our NFT Collectors.

Machine Hallucinations is an-going AI research of data aesthetics at the RAS Lab based on collective visual memories of nature. Since 2016, Anadol and his team have been pioneering custom algorithms to train machine intelligence in processing these vast datasets and unfolding unrecognized layers of our external realities, memories and dreams.

“In 2016, during my artist residency at Google’s Artists and Machine Intelligence (AMI) program, I coined the terms ‘AI Data Painting’and ‘AI Data Sculpture’ as a way to encapsulate a groundbreaking exploration into the creative capacities of artificial intelligence. This concept was born from a profound curiosity: if a machine can learn, can it also dream? Can it hallucinate? These questions propelled my artistic inquiry, leading to the development of visual works that transcend traditional art forms. By harnessing vast datasets and AI algorithms, I sought to visualize the dreams of machines, creating ethereal landscapes that blur the line between the digital and the physical. AI Data Painting thus represents not just a new technique, but a philosophical pondering on the evolving relationship between human creativity and machine intelligence, inviting viewers to contemplate the potential for AI to not only mimic reality but to imagine beyond it.”

Machine Hallucinations: Coral Dreams — AI Data Sculpture

Machine Hallucinations: Coral Dreams is a 40 ft x 40 ft AI data sculpture based on curated 1,742,772 images of coral/reef found on publicly available image databases. With this work, Anadol hopes to bring attention to an urgent environmental problem: the impact of climate change on coral die-offs. A masterfully curated multi-channel experience on Miami Beach, Machine Hallucinations: Coral invites the audience to be immersed in a virtual underwater space while physically surrounded by AI-generated water and sea creatures.

Machine Hallucinations is an-going AI research of data aesthetics at the RAS Lab based on collective visual memories of nature. Since 2016, Anadol and his team have been pioneering custom algorithms to train machine intelligence in processing these vast datasets and unfolding unrecognized layers of our external realities, memories and dreams.

These unique three Artificial Data Sculptures compromise a series that showcase Refik Anadol’s unique collaboration with machine learning at the intersection of technology and environmental aesthetics. By using custom generative algorithms RAS were able to create the very first AI Coral Data Sculptures. Each video in the series displays a 360° rotating data cluster of chosen “hallucinations,” as the artist makes selections from countless serendipitous allusions to coral images occurring in the machine-mind.

Machine Hallucinations is an-going AI research of data aesthetics at the RAS Lab based on collective visual memories of nature. Since 2016, Anadol and his team have been pioneering custom algorithms to train machine intelligence in processing these vast datasets and unfolding unrecognized layers of our external realities, memories and dreams.

Machine Hallucinations – Coral – Generative AI Data Paintings

Using NVIDIA’s StyleGAN2 ADA to capture the machine’s “hallucinations” of coral images and colors in a multi-dimensional space, Refik Anadol Studio trained a unique AI model with subsets of the collected coral archive, creating embeddings in 1024 dimensions. When idle and unsupervised, the AI re-generates the entire archive, constructing new aesthetic image and color combinations based on the coral dataset and through unique custom software to create poetic lines drawn by algorithmic connections. 5 unique AI Data Paintings selected by the artist.