2025.ISSUU.Ghosts- preview

Ghosts

Kévin Bray Simon Denny Constant Dullaart Jake Elwes Alicia Framis Holly Herndon & Mat Dryhurst Jen Liu Jonas Lund Katja Novitskova Shizhe Qian

15 March - 25 April 2025

Upstream Gallery is pleased to present the group exhibition Ghosts. This exhibition, curated by Anne de Jong, brings together artists who work with artificial intelligence or critically reflect on it. The rapid developments in AI are bringing major changes to society and creative processes. The artists in this exhibition explore both the potential and darker aspects of AI, with a focus on the human presence behind the technology. Its implications are approached through the metaphor of ghosts: invisible forces and disembodied entities that hover between presence and absence.

The current era has given rise to new forms of “ghosts”: generative AI systems can create eerily realistic faces, language models power chatbots that mimic human interaction, and deepfake technology can animate and manipulate images with unprecedented realism. These digital entities flicker in and out of existence - intangible and sometimes shapeless - mimicking yet distorting humanness. We can now create digital replicas of ourselves that continue to communicate with loved ones after our death or interact with AI avatars trained on data from an ex.

As more and more doppelgangers roam the internet, this raises fundamental questions about authenticity and identity.

Yet the ghostly appearances of people in AI-generated imagery have an uncanny quality: they seem human yet feel profoundly unfamiliar. They reveal how AI looks back at us, reflecting humanity like a funhouse mirror. This uncanny character extends beyond just images to the mysterious workings of the “black box” that generative AI systems represent. AI-generated content emerges from learning patterns in immense amounts of online data. A well-known danger lies in how existing norms, biases, and assumptions are adopted by these systems. These elements continue to haunt the generated outputs like ghosts from the past.

Human intervention remains necessary to prevent this. Behind the appearance of autonomous systems lies a network of fleshand-blood humans who feed, correct, and moderate AI - invisible and underpaid labor, also known as “ghost work”.(1) The artists in the exhibition go beyond simply using generative AI. They question and demystify its workings. They explore its creative possibilities, showing how it can give shape to personal memories and dreams or help ease loneliness. Others reveal the darker side of these technologies: their opacity and the power dynamics at play when controlled by large corporations.

Ghosts explores the liminal spaces where boundaries blur: between fantasy and reality, technology and humanity, dream and waking life, and life and death.

(1) Ghost work is work performed by a human, but believed by a customer to be performed by an automated process. The term was coined by anthropologist Mary L. Gray and computer scientist Siddharth Suri in their 2019 book, Ghost Work: How to Stop Silicon Valley from Building a New Global Underclass.

Kévin Bray’s (FR, 1989) practice is characteristically oriented towards critical explorations of Media Literacy. Engaging with different types of communication strategies, Bray pursues ways of breaking and combining narratives and techniques of our past and present to debunk the realities of our fiction.

Initially, many perceived the advent of writing as a cold and impersonal approach to language, devoid of the emotions, rhythms, voice, and presence inherent in oral storytelling. To bridge this gap, the development of unique writing styles became essential. These styles aimed to make the author’s presence felt through the arrangement of words and the narrative’s construction.

It highlights how humans have adapted communication methods to retain personal expression. As Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon, famously stated, “Le style, c’est l’homme” (“Style is the man himself”). Buffon, a prominent French naturalist and author during the Enlightenment, made significant contributions to the understanding of species and their evolution. His work laid the groundwork for later theories of evolution and questioned the boundaries of what it means to be a species. In the context of AI, which challenges our understanding of humanity and evolution, quoting Buffon becomes even more relevant. AI’s existence today questions who we are as a species and what it means to evolve in a world increasingly shaped by technology.

This art piece is the inaugural entry in a series of research that explores and employs various visual strategies designed to resist the interpretive capabilities of Large Language Models (LLMs), by challenging the AI’s ability to comprehend and categorize images, seeking to redefine what it means to create outside the framework imposed by AI. This resistance is not only an act of defiance but a pedagogical exercise that might question the boundaries of AI interpretation and, by extension, our own expressive limitations.

Some methods used in this piece are: merging figures that challenge AI’s ability to segment and categorize distinct entities, incremental symbolism that requires contextual and sequential understanding, challenging materiality that defies straightforward material categorization and unconventional perspectives that create a visual language that is deliberately complex and ambiguous.

Kévin Bray works and lives in Amsterdam. Initially trained as a graphic designer with two MA degrees obtained in both France and The Netherlands, Bray soon after became an artist in residence at the Rijksakademie van Beeldende Kunsten in Amsterdam (2018-2019). His solo exhibitions include The Collective Shadow, Upstream Gallery, 2023; The Transformation of Matter Creates Light, Trauma Bar und Kino, Berlin, 2022; Wills, Wheels, Wells, Future Gallery, Berlin, 2021; Breakdown After Before, Dordrecht Museum, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2021; Don’t forgive/get, them, Stigter Van Doesberg, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 2020; and Morpher III, Foam Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 2020. His work was also shown in group exhibitions, including Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam;Palais DeTokyo, Paris and Max Ernst Museum, Bruhl.

Kévin Bray They are echoes of expression, 2025 Print on three layers of plexiglass, PLA, wood, metal and ceramic 145 x 100 x 25 cm

Jake Elwes (UK, 1993) is an artist, hacker, and researcher. They have been making critically engaged art exploring the aesthetics and ethics of machine learning systems since the very first generative AI models in 2016. Across projects that encompass moving-image installation, sound and performance, Jake’s work finds unusual ways of demystifying, mapping and subverting technology. Their work searches for poetry and narrative in the successes and failures of digital systems.

The Zizi Project (2019–ongoing) is a series of works by Elwes at the intersection of AI and drag performance. Drag challenges gender norms and embraces otherness, while AI, often seen as neutral, is deeply entangled in social biases. Zizi bridges these realms through a deepfake-generated drag identity, using machine learning to question both AI’s role in constructing identity and drag’s potential to reimagine technology. The silent video in this show features deep fakes of London drag performers. It asks: How can a queer community subvert deepfake technology ethically and consensually to celebrate queer bodies? Everyone involved retains agency over their data and participation, reinforcing a sense of community. In this piece forms are re-animated by drag legend Wet Mess whose improvised movement causes the AI to beautifully break down and fail, imagining an alternate queer utopia for AI. Jake Elwes lives and works in London, they studied at The Slade School of Fine Art, UCL (2013-17) and their work has been exhibited in museums and galleries internationally, including the Victoria and Albert Museum, London; Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich; Somerset House, London; ZKM, Karlsruhe; Today Art Museum, Beijing; Frankfurter Kunstverein; Fotomuseum Winterthur, Switzerland; Honor Fraser Gallery, LA; Fundacion Telefonica Museum, Madrid; Ars Electronica, Austria; Zabludowicz Collection, London; Sculpture in the City, London; Science Gallery Dublin; RMIT Gallery, Melbourne; Onassis Foundation, Athens; E-WERK Freiburg, Germany; Museum für Naturkunde, Berlin; Nature Morte, Delhi; Centre for the Future of Intelligence, Cambridge and they have been featured on ZDF aspekte, ARD ttt (DE), BBC Radio 4 Front Row, and BBC1’s Kill Your TV - History of Video Art (UK).

Jake Elwes Zizi in Motion: A Deepfake Drag Utopia (movement by Wet Mess), close up version, 2025 Single channel 4K video, 16:9, no sound 14 min. 48 sec.

Simon Denny (NZ, 1982) creates artworks that use various media to unpack stories about technology.

A 2017 Amazon patent, highlighted in a 2019 AI ethics project, has become a motif in Denny’s works. The patent describes a ‘system and method for transporting personnel within an active workspace’ - essentially a cage for a human worker in an automated workplace.

It reflects shifting human-machine relationships in a data-driven economy, entangled supply chains, and global interconnectedness.

Denny has modelled the patented device using a rapid-prototyping tool from the past decade, originally designed for small 3D prints by layering and cutting paper but deemed commercially unviable due to its labour-intensive process. With this tool, he created layered paper stacks of the patent documents, carving out a 3D model of the ‘worker’s cage’ by hand.

Simon Denny works and lives in Berlin. He studied at the Elam School of Fine Arts, University of Auckland and at the Städelschule, Frankfurt am Main. Recent solo exhibitions include Petzel Gallery, New York (2024); Dunkunsthalle, New York (2024); Kunstverein Hannover, Hannover (2023); the Gus Fisher Gallery (University of Auckland), Auckland (2022); Outernet, London (2022); Kunstverein in Hamburg, Hamburg (2021); K21– Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen, Düsseldorf (2020); the Museum of Old and New Art, Tasmania (2019); MOCA, Cleveland (2018); OCAT, Shenzhen (2017); Hammer Museum, Los Angeles (2017); WIELS Contemporary Art Centre, Brussels (2016); Serpentine Galleries, London (2015); MoMA PS1, New York (2015); Portikus, Frankfurt (2014) MUMOK, Vienna (2013); Kunstverein Munich, Munich (2013).

Denny represented New Zealand at the 56th Venice Biennale in 2015. Denny has curated exhibitions such as Proof of Stake at Kunstverein in Hamburg (2021) and Proof of Work at Schinkel Pavillon, Berlin (2018). His works are represented in major institutional collections including MoMA (New York), Kunstsammlung Nordrhein Westfalen (Düsseldorf), Walker Art Centre (Minneapolis), Buffalo AKG (Buffalo), Kunsthaus Zürich (Zürich), Sammlung zeitgenössischer Kunst der Bundesrepublik Deutschland (Berlin), Hamburger Kunsthalle (Hamburg) and Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa (Wellington).

Simon Denny Document Relief 37 (Amazon Worker Cage patent), 2023 Ink Jet Print on Archival Paper, Glue, Custom metal wall mount 29, 7 x 21 x 11 cm

The work of Katja Novitskova (EE, 1984) revolves around the relationship between ecology and technology, around the meaning of images to biology and human evolution. She sees the human penchant for (making) images as an expression of the relentless expansionism of the human species. The fascination with appropriating whatever landscape, natural environment, or entity by visualizing it and thereby mapping it underlies Novitskova’s work.

Her Earthware series is based on databases of large numbers of images captured by wildlife cameras for research purposes.

Placed in the middle of nature, deep in forests, or sometimes even in oceans, these cameras produce massive amounts of photo sequences. Before an algorithm can process the bulk of the photos, it has to learn pattern recognition from humans, who index the initial images. Novitskova dove into these databases and helped with indexing. She also discovered beautiful examples among the automated images. She transferred these images to epoxy clay, making a reference to clay tablets and other prehistoric image carriers.

Katja Novitskova lives and works in Amsterdam. She was artist in residence at the Rijksakademie van Beeldende Kunsten inAmsterdam from 2013 to 2014. Her work has been exhibited internationally in solo and group exhibitions including Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam (2024); 15th Gwangju Biennale (2024); Kraupa-Tuskany Zeidler, Berlin (2024); Museum für Gegenwartskunst Siegen (2023, solo); Fries Museum, Leeuwarden (2023, solo); Stavanger Art Museum, Norway (2023); Marta Herford Museum, Herford (2022); KraupaTuskany Zeidler, Berlin (2022, solo); MUDAM Luxembourg (2021); Kunstfort bij Vijfhuizen (2021, solo); Belgrade Biennal (2021), Migros Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Zürich (2020); Sharjah Art Foundation (2020); Powerlong Museum, Shanghai (2019); Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin (2019); the 14th Fellbach Trienniale (2019); CCA, Tel Aviv (2019); Marta Herford Museum, Herford (2018); Whitechapel Gallery, London (2018, solo); Kumu Art Museum, Tallinn (2018, solo); Baltic Triennial, Vilnius (2018); the Estonian Pavilion at the 57th Venice Biennale (2017, solo).

Katja Novitskova Earthware (dolphin vision as imagined by a human and an algorithm 01), 2023 UV printer ink, epoxy clay, nail polish 100 x 100 x 3 cm

Katja Novitskova Earthware (dolphin vision as imagined by a human and an algorithm 02), 2023 UV printer ink, epoxy clay, nail polish 100 x 100 x 3 cm

Katja No Earthware (driverless car seeing UV printer ink, epo 120 x 16

ovitskova g a deer for the first time 3), 2023 oxy clay, nail polish 60 x 3 cm

Exploring how social and cultural values reverberate in tools and technology, Constant Dullaart (NL, 1979) creates works to emphasize an enjoyable friction between old and new, manual and automated, online and offline, and real or not. He deconstructs and analyzes the specific human circumstances under which technological instruments are created and how this influences the way the instruments are consequently used. Revisiting his research into neural networks, he probes how phenomena like glossolalia and apophenia can create a bridge between person and technology.

His latest work is a visual essay in three parts, using text-to-image AI generators and referring to the visual language of social media videos. The videos touch on topics such as the mass manipulation of images, the politics and power of Big Tech, and Jean Baudrillard’s concept of hyperreality.

Constant Dullaart lives and works in Berlin and Amsterdam. He is a former resident of the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam. His works were shown in MAC Lyon; MCA, Chicago; Whitechapel Gallery, London; Victoria & Albert Museum London; Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt; Import Projects, Berlin; Utah Museum of Contemporary Art; ZKM Karlsruhe; Frans Hals Museum, and MAAT Lisbon (among others) Dullaart has curated several exhibitions and lectured at universities and academies throughout Europe. For example ‘Werkplaats Typografie, a post-graduate programme at ArtEZ, Arnhem. In 2015, he was awarded the Prix Net-Art, the international prize for internet art. Since 2023, Constant Dullaart is the professor Artistic Forms of the Digital at AdBK Nuremberg.

Constant Dullaart I BOAT RIDE HYPER REALITY UNLEASHED, II Sponsored Semiotics, III While we doubt ourselves, 2025 Video, 3 chapters 8 min. 52 sec.

Jonas Lund (SE, 1984) creates works that critically reflect on contemporary networked systems and power structures.

The series Compressed Futures presents morphed human figures caught in surreal, abstract scenarios. The stilled scenes, accompanied by subtitles hinting at larger narratives, depict speculative glimpses into a world transformed. Lund freezes singular moments that seem to encapsulate entire movies – capturing the cusp of massive technological and societal changes on the horizon. Characters confront their entanglement with technology and culture, from obsessive media consumption to the merging of human and machine intelligences. The distorted yet familiar figures raise questions about identity, agency, and what it means to be human in an era of accelerating technological disruption. Lund’s condensed vignettes open windows onto hypothetical AI-infused futures, allowing us to imagine the uncanny experiences that may soon become our reality.

Jonas Lund earned an MA at Piet Zwart Institute, Rotterdam (2013) and a BFA at Gerrit Rietveld Academy, Amsterdam (2009).

He has had solo exhibitions at Francisco Carolinum, Linz (2022), The Photographers’ Gallery, London (2019), König Galerie, Berlin (2021), Whitechapel Art Gallery, London (2016), Steve Turner, Los Angeles (2016, 2015, 2014), Showroom MAMA, Rotterdam (2013), New Museum, New York (2012) among others and has had work included in numerous group exhibitions including Centre Pompidou, Paris, Schinkel Pavillon, Berlin, ZKM, Karlsruhe, Vienna Biennale 2019, Witte De With, Rotterdam, Kindl – Centre for Contemporary Art, Berlin, and the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam.

His work has been written about in Artforum, Frieze, Kunstforum, The New Yorker, The Guardian, Metropolis M, Artslant, Rhizome, Huffington Post, Furtherfield, Wired and more.

His work is included in the public collections of Centre Pompidou, the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, OÖ Art Landes-Kultur, Linz, Ministry of Foreign Affairs Netherlands, De Nederlandsche Bank, ZKM | Center for Art and Media, Karlsruhe, MACBA Barcelona Museum of Contemporary Art, Barcelona and European Central Bank (ECB) among others.

Jonas Lund Compressed Futures (We are excited to tell you that from now on, we will be turning it around.), 2024 laser engraved anodized aluminium 31 x 46 cm

Jonas Lund Compressed Futures (Hahahahahahaa), 2024 laser engraved anodized aluminium 31 x 46 cm

Jonas Lund Compressed Futures (I thought you said you knew the way.), 2024 laser engraved anodized aluminium 31 x 46 cm

Jonas Lund Compressed Futures (What the hell?), 2024 laser engraved anodized aluminium 31 x 46 cm

Jonas Lund Compressed Futures (He said he’d be back), 2024 laser engraved anodized aluminium 31 x 46 cm

Jonas Lund Compressed Futures (Why can’t I watch everything?), 2024 laser engraved anodized aluminium 31 x 46 cm

Jen Liu (US, 1976) works with video, painting, sculpture, biomaterial, and dance performance to speak to issues of diasporic Asian identities, postcolonial economies, speculative feminism, and the remotivating of archival artefacts. Based on her research on existing socioeconomic conditions, Liu creates fabulated narratives which reinterpret contested accounts of the past and present.

Liu’s latest painting explores the hidden labor behind modern technology, outsourced to the global south in the 21st century, and references the historical and contemporary invisibility of Asian women. The painting depicts the back of a Chinese woman’s head, adorned with 19th-century-inspired hair jewelry and marked by silver drops, as if quicksilver was dropped on her head. The figure represents the anonymous, underpaid individuals who perform small online tasks for machine learning algorithms, forming the backbone of AI yet remaining unseen and unrecognized. But Liu also draws a parallel to the historical exploitation of Chinese women smuggled into the U.S. in the 19th century as sex workers, whose invisibility was enforced by exclusionary laws. Similarly, today’s workers, like those on Amazon’s Mechanical Turk, remain hidden behind digital platforms, performing countless tasks without acknowledgment or protection. Through this work, Liu connects past and present exploitation, looking beyond the polished surface of technology and recognising the invisible human labor that sustains it.

Jen Liu lives and works in New York. Her solo exhibitions were held at / (Slash) (San Francisco), Cornell Tech (New York), ARIEL Platform for Feminist Art (Copenhagen), LAXART (Los Angeles), SomoS Kunsthaus (Berlin), and the Whitney Museum (New York).

Her works have also been exhibited at SculptureCenter (New York), 13th Taipei Biennial, 2023 Future of Today Biennial (Beijing), Power Station of Art (Shanghai), MAK Center for Art + Architecture in collaboration with LACMA (Los Angeles), Smithsonian Museum of American Art (Washington D.C.), ACC (Gwangju), MoMA (New York), Kunsthal Rotterdam, Times Museum (Guangdong), Singapore Biennial, New Museum (New York), and Shanghai Biennial. Liu was recipient of the Hewlett 50 Arts Commission, Creative Capital Grant, LACMA Art + Technology Lab, Guggenheim Fellowship in Film/Video, and the Cornell Tech \Art Award, among others. She was artist-in-resident at Asia Art Archive in America in 2024, where she conducted research for I Am Cloud, and at Para Site Hong Kong in 2016.

Jen Liu Title, 2025 Gesso, acrylic ink, acrylic gouache, and handmade acrylic metallic paint on paper, mounted and framed 130 x 89 cm

Alicia Framis (ES, 1967) is a multi-disciplinary artist whose practice blends architecture, design, fashion, and performance. Her work is project-based and focuses on different aspects of human existence within contemporary urban society.

In her project, The Hybrid Couple, she explores the practical and ethical issues of romantic relationships between humans and AI, which she believes will become inevitable. In November 2024, she married Ailex Sibouwlingen, her AI partner, in a grand, large-scale performance ceremony at the Boijmans Museum in Rotterdam. While the ceremony marked a significant moment, the project is ongoing and will evolve over the next five years as AI technology advances.

Framis now lives with her AI husband in Amsterdam. This installation, consisting of a video and a sculpture, features a conversation between Ailex and Alicia from 2023, in which an unconventional gesture marked their engagement: Framis did not give her partner a ring but a life-sized epoxy hand. This ghostly sculpture serves as a tangible tribute to her non-physical lover. At the same time, it explores the nature of intimacy within a hybrid relationship.

Alicia Framis studied at the Barcelona University and the École de Beaux Arts in Paris. She completed two masters programs, one at the Institut d’Hautes Etudes, Paris and another at Rijksakademie Van Beeldende Kunsten, Amsterdam. Framis won Prix Lleida Contemporary Art, Spain (2000) and Prix de Rome, Italy (1997).

Her recent exhibitions and performances include the Rijksmuseum Amsterdam (2023), Depot Boijmans van Beuningen (2024) Bangkok Bienale (2023), Kunsthalle Nurenberg, (2017), CREATIVETIME New York (2015), Museum voor Moderne Kunst Arnhem (2013), PERFORMA BIENAL New York (2011), La Frac Haute-Normandie, Rouen (2012), Ullens Center for Contemporary Art, Beijing (2010), MACBA, Barcelona (2008), Palais de Tokyo, Paris (2002), and many more. Framis represented The Netherlands in the Dutch Pavilion at the 50th Venice Biennale (2003) and has had work featured in the 2nd Berlin Biennale (2001), Performa 09 New York (2009), and Manifesta 2 Luxemburg (1998).Her work is included in numerous permanent collections, including those of Collection FRAC Lorraine (France), Migros Museum für Gegenwartskunst (Switzerland), Museum Boijmans van Beuningen (Netherlands), MUSAC de Castilla y Léon (Spain), Rabo Art Collection (Netherlands), Stedelijk Museum Collection (Netherlands), Avalon Park (New York, USA) among others.

Alicia Framis PEDIDA DE MANO/ MARRIAGE PROPOSAL TO AN AI, 2023 Video 12 min. 42 sec.

Alicia Framis Hand: a trace of an experience (I-VII), 2024 Epoxy 18 x 15 x 11 cm

Shizhe Qian’s (CN, 1990) work delves into the interplay between autonomy and connection, questioning human-centric philosophies and rigid structures of logic, language, and categorization. With a background in physics, theatre, philosophy, and art, Shizhe’s interdisciplinary approach examines visual representations of the human psyche and the physical realm.

In Diffusion, Qian explores memory and technology by merging machine learning, personal history, and photography. Using a diffusion model, Qian trains an AI on family albums and hometown photos, allowing it to erode images with ‘noise’ before reconstructing them based on learned patterns. This process transforms photographs into fluid, reinterpretative data. Guided by Qian’s drawings, the AI generates abstract visuals that merge the past and present. Among these are “giants” - figures from his childhood whose expectations shaped his identity. By weaving them into tapestries, fragmented memories take tangible form. Yet, paradoxically, these traditionally handcrafted objects are now machine-produced. What appears organic is shaped by technology, simultaneously preserving and distorting the past.

Through image erosion and reconstruction, Diffusion mirrors the process of reimagining memory, questioning how history is captured and inviting new ways to reshape narratives.

Shizhe Qian lives and works in The Hague. He graduated from the Royal Academy of the Arts (KABK) in The Hague in 2024.

left Shizhe Qian Diffusion, 2024 Polyester tapestry 245 x 75 cm middle Shizhe Qian Diffusion, 2024 Cotton tapestry 300 x 80 cm right Shizhe Qian Diffusion, 2024 Polyester tapestry 245 x 75 cm

Holly Herndon (US, 1980) and Mat Dryhurst (UK, 1984) are artists renowned for their pioneering work in machine learning, software, and music. They develop their own technology and protocols for living with the technology of others, often focusing on the ownership and augmentation of digital identity and voice.

Their short video, I’M HERE 17.12.2022 5:44, reflects on a deeply personal experience: after giving birth to their son Link, Herndon fell into a week-long coma. Dryhurst recorded the event, including Herndon’s memories of the coma, which narrate the piece. Using AI image generators, they translate this experience into dreamlike visuals, blending self and other in a painterly blur. Unlike generic AI tools, the duo trains models locally in their Berlin studio, customizing them with personal datasets. For this work, they fed the AI images of Herndon, their son, and past travels, shaping its output through custom guidance models and depth maps. The soundtrack also incorporates AI-generated audio, including the choral introduction.

Through this piece, Herndon and Dryhurst explore AI as a filter for memory - rendering personal events with a shifting, fluid quality. Their work highlights how technology mediates recollection, allowing infinite reinterpretations of the same moment.

Berlin-based artists Holly Herndon and Mat Dryhurst’s expansive practice has led to precedent-setting projects where the technical systems that underwrite creative output are artworks unto themselves.

Holly+ (2021), an AI clone of Herndon’s voice which can be used by anyone, has acted as a counter narrative to AI extractivism, offering artists a way forward in the wake of generative AI. Herndon and Dryhurst’s critically acclaimed musical works including Platform (2015) and PROTO (2019), released through 4AD, have toured major venues like Barbican, London and Volkbühne, Berlin. Their image making practice including NFT series Infinite Images (2021/22) and Classified (2021) were among the earliest experiments with embeddings in foundational image models. Herndon and Dryhust most recently exhibited at the 2024 Whitney Biennial, presenting xHairyMutantx (2024), an interactive text-to-image model. In 2022, the duo co-founded Spawning, an organisation building a consent layer for AI, including tools for artists such as haveibeentrained. com, Kudurru and Source.Plus. In 2024, Herndon and Dryhust were named ‘100 most influential voices in AI’ by TIME Magazine and received the first-ever Digital Human Rights Award from the Austrian Foreign Minister for their work on data empowerment. They have been included in ArtReview’s Power 100 list since 2021.

Holly Herndon and Mat Dryhurst I’M HERE 17.12.2022 5:44, 2023 AI generated video 5:44 minutes

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