Flora II

By Nate Davis

 

These four works are from my Flora II series, which currently consists of 514 images. For almost two decades, I have created electronic music and visual art by simulating biological and evolutionary processes using software of my own design. In these simulations, organisms grow, reproduce, compete for resources, and die, and what you see is a visual abstraction of these processes. Randomness plays a major role, both in the initial conditions of the simulation and in the unpredictability of mutations, the availability of resources, and the like. The creation of this art is a spiritual as well as an aesthetic practice: I accept the results without exerting control over the moment-by-moment unfolding of the work. 

My art seeks to illuminate some aspects of the physical reality that undergirds – and thus unifies – most life on Earth. Such unity is essentially metaphysical or even mystical in nature and touching it has long been a gateway to individual awareness of the importance of conservation and sustainability.