“Impossible Evolutions” by Kate Geck

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Title:

Impossible Evolutions

Artist(s) and People Involved:

Artist Statement:

Impossible Evolutions uses generative machine learning models in the design of woven tapestries, which in turn unfold ways of thinking about the entanglements of human and machine intelligences. The project uses Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs) and diffusion models to imagine iterations of endangered Australian butterflies and wildflowers. These ‘impossible’ machine-imagined evolutions gesture to the futures we face as biodiversity decreases: there will be no further generations or modulations of these species. The generated images are composed into three textile weavings of place, actual tapestries of the interconnected lives that generate each creature’s ecosystem. By reflecting on the interweaving of conditions that has disrupted each ecological niche, space is opened to think about unseen sensory worlds (Richmond Birdwing butterfly), symbiotic exchange (Bulloak Jewel butterfly) and stewardship (Sunshine Diuris orchid). Each story becomes a fabric both literal and metaphorical, with this ‘textillic thinking’ offering speculative vantage points for approaching the emerging relations between human and machine intelligences. This textillic thinking interweaves creativity, collaboration and care: conditions which are foregrounded in textile-making practices and disrupted in each creature’s ecological story.