Words that Remake The World (2025 Versions)
Landscape & mapping, Bespoke software pipeline, Godgaze aesthetics, Satellite, Prints & drawings, Artificial intelligences
Two intimate reworkings of the colossal drawing ‘Words That Remake The World «The Seeker»’ (2019) These drawings explore how the data becomes effectively 'blackboxed' and illegible through the change of scale.
Words That Remake The World (Silent Version), 2025
Giclée print on Photo Rag paper
400mm × 470mm
Limited Edition of 10 + 2 A/Ps
Words That Remake The World (Loud Version), 2025
Giclée print on Photo Rag paper
400mm × 470mm
Limited Edition of 10 + 2 A/Ps
'The Seeker' (2016-19)
Back in 2018 Thompson created an AI-based software system called The Seeker. The Seeker was a demiurge-like entity that existed within the infrastructure of the Internet; it watched the world through millions of security cameras, analysing and naming the things it saw. This project contemplated the growing ability of machines to describe the world and how this might establish a whole new worldview for machines and humans alike.
'Words That Remake The World «The Seeker»' in the 'Artificially Intelligent' display at the V&A Museum, 2019.
During its active life The Seeker described tens of thousands of its visions: objects and concepts it identified through its CCTV eyes. These visions were mapped into a giant drawing 'Words That Remake The World «The Seeker»' which is now in the V&A Museum’s national collection, and features in the recent book 'Digital Art: 1960s to Now'.