Cryptographic Beings 藝術裝置 by Michael Sedbon

Cryptographic Beings 藝術裝置 by Michael Sedbon is a highly esteemed winner of the very prestigious 2023 A' Design Award 銀獎 in 裝置設計 Competition Category.

銀裝置· 2023

Cryptographic Beings 藝術裝置

by Michael Sedbon

Client: Michael Sedbon

A' Design Award 銀獎 Winner in 裝置 Category

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Colors

The Design

About Cryptographic Beings 藝術裝置

《Cryptographic Beings》係一件將數碼資料儲存喺活體藻類入面嘅藝術裝置。作品由三十個植物位元組成，每個位元都係一個載住絲狀藻類嘅玻璃容器。光合作用會產生氣囊，令藻類喺光照下浮起、喺黑暗中下沉。每一個浮沉狀態代表數碼嘅零或者一，成個裝置可以儲存一個五個字母嘅單詞。電動機械臂控制照射到每個容器嘅光線，而特製嘅顏色感應器就負責讀取每個狀態。呢部機器可以喺展覽期間自主運作幾個月。

The Recognition

About the A' Design Award 銀獎

Cryptographic Beings 藝術裝置是 A' Design Award 銀獎得主，這是授予頂級、華美而令人印象深刻的設計的極為崇高的認可。銀獎得主是極其卓越、極具創造力的作品，展現出其設計師傑出的專業技能、才華與敏銳。預計Cryptographic Beings 藝術裝置將成為一件出色的典範之作，兼具非凡的專業性與深刻的創新性。這件贏得 A' Design Award 銀獎的設計是一項備受矚目、令人欽佩的發明，造福並拓展藝術、科學、設計和技術的界限。Cryptographic Beings 藝術裝置是一件令人羨慕的創作，它喚起渴望，帶來積極的情感，並激發驚嘆與讚嘆。

Behind the Design

Press Kit

Credits, team members and technical details provided by the designer.

Unique Properties: Cryptographic Beings is a technological proposal that leverages our ability to control and abstract biology to perform digital information storage.

Marimos are large spherical colonies of algea.

Photosynthetic activity produces gas vesicles visible to the naked eye
This property allows them to float when exposed to light and sink in the dark

This property is used to store digital data: The floating or sinking state representing digital 0s or 1s
This robotic setup is capable of storing a 5 letter word
Dimensions & Packaging: Width : 60 cm
height : 300 cm
Depth : 60 cm
Weight : 300 Kg
Tags: Artificial Living Intelligence, Synthetic Biology, Bio-Hybrid Computers, Living Machines, New Media Art, Robotic
Production Technology: This work was developed as part of an ongoing research project on bio-hybrid computation exploring the possible morpho-space of computing devices. Michael Sedbon questions the information-processing properties of living matter through the creation of novel technologies embed into sculptural artefacts.
This work has been developed as a functional prototype of a digital data storage device on vegetal media. It uses living algae, custom electronic and software code to store information.
Design Challenge: Cryptographic being is both a technological and an artistic proposal. The technology used to store digital information in vegetal media is a pure creation for this work. During its development, numerous technical challenges such as the design of custom sensors and engineered mechanical parts had to be overcome.
As an artistic project, it also had to communicate its (highly technical) subject in an understandable manner. Great care was placed in rendering biological processes visible.
Research: Living organisms perceive and interact with their environment through computation. Recent advances in the life sciences allow researchers and designers to envision machines of new kinds that leverage the massive and specific capacities of living matter in computing.
How would these bio-hybrid machines change our perception of nature and culture, what can be used to compute, what can be computed and what form will they take? These are the question this work approach.
Inspiration: The first part of the 20th century witnessed simultaneously the discovery of the basis of information storage in DNA and the revolutions of the modern computing era.

Since then, the fields of computer science and modern biology have co-evolved in a conceptual framework that looks at life as an information processing system and at digital computations as Intelligence.

This cultural relationship is allowing us to design new kinds of bio-hybrid computers leveraging the massive capacity of life.
Project Duration: The project was conceptualised and prototyped in summer 2021. The production occurred from September 2021 to March 2022. This work was shown at Au Dela Des Pixel, a digital art exhibition curated and organised by 36 Degres, in March 2022 in Paris.
Operation Flow: This autonomous machine consists of an array of 30 vegetal bits made of filamentous algae held in glass vessels. The control of the information flow is handled by a set of specifically developed robotic arms that control photosynthetic processes in each of the bits. The state of each bit (the digital information) is retrieved by a custom-made device based on a colour sensor.
The machine is designed to run autonomously for months throughout an exhibition.
Team Members: Michael Sedbon