Pierre Huyghe Mind's Eye (F), 2021
Materialized deep image reconstruction
Synthetic and biological material aggregate; micro-organisms
Synthetic and biological material aggregate; micro-organisms
100 x 92 x 62 cm (39 3/8 x 36 1/4 x 24 3/8 in)
Unique in a series of 2 plus 1 artist's proof
Pierre Huyghe's Mind’s Eye belongs to a series of unique three-dimensional works composed of organic and inorganic materials.
The specific shapes of the Mind's Eye works bring up immediate associations with natural forms of general familiarity: an animal, a vegetable, an organ. The shapes originate in Huyghe's media work UUmwelt, a real-time generated sequence of morphing images that is generated by a specific scanner and a computer. The sequence of images and the shapes that it generates are based on registered brain activity of visual recognition, or 'mental images.' In other words, images of the UUmwelt multimedia installation are a computer translation of how a specific, familiar image is perceived by the neuronal network of a human brain. Each unique work in the series Mind’s Eye materializes such generated images into a three-dimensional form, still retaining the aspect of familiarity with the original perceived image.
Huyghe has described the series like this:
Mind’s Eye is a materialized deep image reconstruction, a mental image output from UUmwelt, first presented at the Serpentine in 2018. UUmwelt is a co-production of imagination between human and machine, using a brain-computer interface.
A set of elementary components – building blocks of a speculative situation – were given as images or descriptions to be imagined by a subject, among them biological entities, prehistoric tools, machines, code, and artworks. As the subject imagines these components, brain activity was captured by an fMRI scanner and an engineered deep neural network learned to recognize the brain-data patterns and then attempted to reconstruct the mental images.
Mental images can circulate from mind to mind, outside the realm of appearance, as synthetic telepathic conversation, or be externalized from the subjects’ minds and manifest themselves physically.
Mind’s Eye is an artefact of the imaginary realm, a precipitate occupying the space. It lies in an ambiguous continuity between human visual imagination, artificial intelligence, data and matter.
— Pierre Huyghe
Works from this series are part of the following public collections:
– Museum of Modern Art, New York
– Centro de Arte Contemporânea Inhotim, Brumadinho
– Leeum Museum of Art, Seoul
COMPONENTS INCLUDED IN SALE:
– Sculpture
– Touch up material: sugar in various colors, colophonium, agar-agar, pieces of slag
INSTALLATION SPECIFICATIONS:
– The work can be installed indoors only.
– The work weighs 200 kg approx.
– To handle and install the work, a team of 3-4 people is recommended. Forklift or gantry, pallet jack, slings, drill, glue, and a small cooking pan with heat source to melt touch-up materials will be required.
– For more details about installation and maintenance, please refer to the provided installation and maintenance manuals
The specific shapes of the Mind's Eye works bring up immediate associations with natural forms of general familiarity: an animal, a vegetable, an organ. The shapes originate in Huyghe's media work UUmwelt, a real-time generated sequence of morphing images that is generated by a specific scanner and a computer. The sequence of images and the shapes that it generates are based on registered brain activity of visual recognition, or 'mental images.' In other words, images of the UUmwelt multimedia installation are a computer translation of how a specific, familiar image is perceived by the neuronal network of a human brain. Each unique work in the series Mind’s Eye materializes such generated images into a three-dimensional form, still retaining the aspect of familiarity with the original perceived image.
Huyghe has described the series like this:
Mind’s Eye is a materialized deep image reconstruction, a mental image output from UUmwelt, first presented at the Serpentine in 2018. UUmwelt is a co-production of imagination between human and machine, using a brain-computer interface.
A set of elementary components – building blocks of a speculative situation – were given as images or descriptions to be imagined by a subject, among them biological entities, prehistoric tools, machines, code, and artworks. As the subject imagines these components, brain activity was captured by an fMRI scanner and an engineered deep neural network learned to recognize the brain-data patterns and then attempted to reconstruct the mental images.
Mental images can circulate from mind to mind, outside the realm of appearance, as synthetic telepathic conversation, or be externalized from the subjects’ minds and manifest themselves physically.
Mind’s Eye is an artefact of the imaginary realm, a precipitate occupying the space. It lies in an ambiguous continuity between human visual imagination, artificial intelligence, data and matter.
— Pierre Huyghe
Works from this series are part of the following public collections:
– Museum of Modern Art, New York
– Centro de Arte Contemporânea Inhotim, Brumadinho
– Leeum Museum of Art, Seoul
COMPONENTS INCLUDED IN SALE:
– Sculpture
– Touch up material: sugar in various colors, colophonium, agar-agar, pieces of slag
INSTALLATION SPECIFICATIONS:
– The work can be installed indoors only.
– The work weighs 200 kg approx.
– To handle and install the work, a team of 3-4 people is recommended. Forklift or gantry, pallet jack, slings, drill, glue, and a small cooking pan with heat source to melt touch-up materials will be required.
– For more details about installation and maintenance, please refer to the provided installation and maintenance manuals