This year’s edition of the AR Biennale is entitled “Hybrid Nature” and is organised by the NRW Forum in Düsseldorf. With “BugSim” Theo Triantafyllidis & Mirevi present their artwork alongside other international artists in the Hofgarten in Düsseldorf from May 13, 2023.
“BugSim” shows an abstract pink structure that serves as both breeding ground as well as habitat for the autonome eco system. An ant colony, bees, flowers, grasshopper, spiders, snails, and butterflies are living in this biotope.
In a pre-development workshop the Mirevi team and the artist worked together to find a visual and technical solution for the transition from a primarily digital form to AR. The type of simulation and interaction in AR should therefore be both meaningful and interesting to the users.
Ultimately, this constructed natural cycle for the organisms has been further developed in this collaboration. Visitors can interact with the ecosystem in real time. They can feed the bees with sugar cubes, butterflies recognise the physical presence of users in AR and avoid them, users can produce water vapour that changes the humidity and thus the living conditions – but this simulation could also run autonomously for weeks without dying.
Among other things, Mirevi developed the code of the ant colony, technically implementing the complex pheromone-based algorithm of their movements. The team also designed the bees. Both codes have the meticulous signature of all Mirevi’s work, giving the autonomous microcosm an authenticity that truly brings the artwork to life.