In the immersive exhibition Model Collapse, Cyanne van den Houten and Ymer Marinus depict the landscape from which generative AI emerges. From relics, artefacts, and past stories, they reveal the self-consuming origins of AI systems rooted in resource and data extraction.
Model Collapse features cyber sculptures with algorithmically defined forms and characters. These sculptures or entities resist dominant narratives tied to AI’s creation, each telling stories of mystification, gender bias, non-Western algorithmic traditions, ecological impact, and hidden labor. Visitors engage with the sculptures by typing a query to a central AI interface. A local language model locates the query in the digital realm, awakening the relevant sculpture so it can share its knowledge. The visitor’s input dynamically sets the scene, activating the sculptures’ generative digital biome. This interaction sparks a chain of events—what starts with a few words ripples through multiple dimensions. New insights emerge, and invisible pathways inside AI systems are revealed.