Poetry extracted from a sequence of GIFs, forest camera images, astronomical, and microscopic images – datasets used to teach artificial intelligence about nature.
A GIF assemblage of images from various datasets the artist indexed on a citizen science platform, where volunteers are asked to index, draw on, and categorize images from various datasets, usually with the goal of training image processing AI algorithms.
The images Novitskova worked on mostly include wildlife cam photos, astronomy, snail embryos, and monkey blood cells. If the overabundance of instrumental, machine-readable images may cheapen any meaning or aesthetic value, Novitskova actively digs some poetry out of these datasets.
Such poetry comes from a combination of technology and the reality that it attempts to capture: glowing eyes of animals that reflect the flash-light of the camera, digital low-resolution artifacts, accidentally stunning compositions of galaxies and forests, etc. The GIF’s mechanical speed is faster than the usual human perception—it is functional to the machine gaze, but in itself, it creates a new type of poetic image, too.
Katja Novitskova lives and works in Amsterdam. Novitskova researches ongoing ecological transformations of living, social, and informational processes in the present world, developing personal strategies to render its complex forms. Her works include sculptures generated from online imagery and text, installations and artist publications.
In 2011, Novitskova published her first artist book Post Internet Survival Guide 2010. Her work has been exhibited internationally in solo and group exhibitions including Kunstfort bij Vijfhuizen (2021, solo); Belgrade Biennal (2021); Migros Museum, Zürich (2020); Sharjah Art Foundation (2020); Powerlong Museum, Shanghai (2019); Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin (2019); Whitechapel Gallery, London (2018, solo), the Estonian Pavilion at the 57th Venice Biennale (2017, solo); The Public Art Fund, New York (2017, solo), The Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma, Helsinki (2017); and Greene Naftali, New York (2016, solo).
Her work is in various public and private collections, including: Museum Ludwig, Cologne; Moderna Museet, Stockholm; Boros Collection, Berlin; CC Foundation, Shanghai; Fondazione Sandretto Re Rebaudengo, Turin; Rubell Family Collection, Miami, and many others.
