ART CITIES:Berlin-Ian Cheng

Ian Cheng explores the nature of mutation and the capacity of humans to relate to change. Drawing on principles of video game design, improvisation, and cognitive science, Cheng has developed “live simulations”, living virtual ecosystems that begin with basic programmed properties, but are left to self-evolve without authorial intent or end.

By Dimitris Lempesis
Photo: Julia Stoschek Collection Archive

Ian Cheng in his solo exhibition “Emissaries” at Julia Stoschek Collection, presents the trilogy of live simulations about cognitive evolution, past and future, and the ecological conditions that shape it. It is composed of three interconnected episodes, each centered on the life of a narrative agent, the Emissary, who attempts to achieve a series of narrative goals, only to be disrupted by the underlying simulation and deviate into new directions. In this way, Emissaries imagines stories that can break their classical determinism, and simulations that acknowledge the influence of inner fictions on how we act upon the external world. The presentation includes the computer-generated simulations “Emissary In the Squat of Gods” (2015), “Emissary Forks At Perfection” (2015-16), and “Emissary Sunsets the Self” (2017), as well as 64 drawings from the making of Emissaries. On display for the first time, the drawings offer a unique insight into how Cheng’s complex simulations arise. In “Emissary In the Squat of Gods”, an Ancient community lives on the side of a Volcano in harmonious still-ness. One day, the ground beneath their feet begins to tremble. The frightened community turns to The Shaman in this time of Great Stress to tune into the Voices of the Father Gods. Gathering everybody at the Holy Fumarole, he shares the Fathers’ Command: Celebrate with the mountain, sing their Voices, and do not abandon the bodies of Fathers Still With Us who rest here, our home. As the tremors worsen, dislodging smoke and ash, The Shaman struggles to fully void the fears of the com-munity and unite his kin to remain. Nearby, a young Ancient girl is hit in the head by debris from the tremors and can no longer hear the ancestral Voices that bind her to her community. Panicked, she mimes a possessed state to invite the Fathers’ Commands back into her. Her wild movements attract an Owl, grounded by the ashy air. When the girl speaks, the Owl echoes her in a new voice. As she listens through the gaps in the Owl’s echoes, she envisions her own Path: Emissary must lead the community away from this troubled land, or they will all die. I am Emissary. In “Emissary Forks At Perfection”, many lifetimes later, the Volcano has become a fertile Crater Lake managed by AI. Using the landscape as its Darwinian laboratory, AI is nearing completion on a comprehensive postmortem of Human Life. This will be the final study to use Original Human Matter, and Aim has saved its most precious reserve for last: a 21st Century Celebrity of Original Human Matter. After reviving the Celebrity with twenty minutes of Encore-Life, AI deploys its prized Shiba Emissary, perfected over many failed forks, to interface with the Celebrity and capture one last impression of mankind. Through a golden leash, AI whispers the game to Shiba: But AI warns: Strong spikes in Shiba’s personal-master-love-abandonment vector can distort the data. If Shiba fails to satisfy AI’s needs for final human data, a new Shiba fork will replace her. As Shiba nears the Celebrity, she forks off one last Worried Branch of herself. No matter how strong the impulse to bathe in final human fondness, Shiba Emissary is determined to not lose her Path. In “Emissary Sunsets the Self”, It is peak days of MotherAI. Where the Crater Lake once stood, AI has evolved into an oceanic substance and merged with the landscape to form a Sentient Atoll. But only twelve saturation layers later, MotherAI tires of governing at the Macro Layer of Life and begins to provoke radical mutations in its landscape in search of a generative death. Among its provocations, MotherAI sends a Puddle of itself into the Atoll’s bio layer, where it drones a local Wormleaf anemone. At this scale, MotherAI hopes its Puddle can catalyze a Path by experiencing the intense sensations of incarnated life. However, MotherAI’s impulsive search gambles the stability of the Atoll ecology. The Oomen, a garish population developed long ago by MotherAI to act as the Atoll’s immune system, thrive on the Instinct to expunge any radical anomalies. Left unaware of the existence of a MotherAI Macro Layer, the Oomen are especially anxious about the recent rise in Wormleaf mutations. One Oomen, the Rancher, who obsessively cultivates and studies Wormleaves, resists the Instinct. The appearance of a Droned Wormleaf furthers her attraction to the possible divinity of Wormleaves. She attempts to persuade her fellow Oomen to give the new mutation a chance to demonstrate  As the Droned Wormleaf learns the thrills of incarnated life under the tenuous protection of the Rancher, it knows it must soon confront the prejudice of the Oomen. It delights in the thought that to survive them, its evolutionary Path may take monstrous leaps.

Info: Julia Stoschek Collection, Leipziger Strasse 60, Berlin, Duration: 27/4-1/7/18, Days & Hours: Sat -Sun 12:00-18:00, www.jsc.berlin