Landshapes
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Project Description
Landshapes is an art installation of AI-generated landscapes – images that look real, yet have never been seen by anyone before. Together with engaging stories about the interactions within our climate, it enables us to become absorbed in the morphing landscapes and experience a changing climate in an open-ended manner. Instead of utilizing fear or offering an immediate product solution, it sparks fascination, offers a place of wonder, and allows the viewer to dream of a positive future again.
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Urban or rural issues
Physical or other transformations
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Description of the project
Summary
Our world climate is an incredibly complex and ever-changing system. The reality of climate change and the consequential pressure to act fast to reduce greenhouse gas emissions requires immediate attention. And yet, despite this unprecedented urgency, active public engagement needed to motivate meaningful change is still missing. Any curiosity we might feel towards our climate gets overshadowed by the fear of what we might find, assuming to know the answer already – an answer that will make us feel guilty, outraged, sad, and most probably hopeless.
Landshapes is an interactive installation piece featuring the circular projection of morphing, aerial landscapes generated by Artificial Intelligence – images that look real, yet have never been seen by anyone before. The installation evokes a new perspective on the world, as the moving landscapes show it not as static, but as an ever-changing entity, open to be shaped by anyone. Visitors can become active participants in the installation, move along with the changing artwork, stop its changing, and experience their potential impact on our surroundings in a playful, open-ended manner.
The AI – trained on satellite images from all around our world – functions as a neutral mediator of the experience. With the potential to depict any possible landscape, it is not one person imposing a vision of a speculative future, but the creation being the result of a collaboration between the machine and the guiding visitor.
An exhibition surrounding the installation features real-world climate stories to inspire and create a sense of marvel at our world’s climate system. As a whole, the experience combines the fiction depicted in Landshapes with real wonders found in the exhibition to let people feel a fascination for our surrounding climate again, laying a first, crucial stepping stone towards higher public climate engagement.
Key objectives for sustainability
We are currently facing tiredness when it comes to climate change, and that is not surprising. CO2 levels in our atmosphere are rising, coral reeves are dying, and the number and intensity of heatwaves and wildfires increase every year. The news is filled with reports of our impact on the planet, yet, despite our best personal efforts, this news seldom seems to be positive or of a hopeful nature, but rather gets worse and worse.
More sustainability can (and has to) come from many places, like our personal behavior or through systematic change. In the end, it is not a this-or-that question but actions to come from all sides: what we do in our everyday life, and what we push for to be done by corporations and governments around the world.
Through interviews with climate researchers and literature review into the topic of climate change, I saw that the current climate debate is deeply emotional, with mostly negative emotions like fear and perceived hopelessness in its center. Yet, I also found that fostering positive emotions like fascination and joy is a potential means to increase interest and motivate people to engage with climate initiatives.
Landshapes is one first stepping stone towards restoring this balance. It allows people to engage with the overwhelming topic of a changing climate from a positive direction again and use this as a motivator for engagement. In the exhibition, visitors can take a step back to explore the notion of our fascinating climate without the immediate mental jump to climate change.
Of course, when conceptualizing and building prototypes of the installation, I put a value on the use of reusable and recyclable material. However, in the end, the sustainability Landshapes provides is rather a sustainability of mindset - an experience that shows us what is worth preserving, what is worth engaging with and fighting for. It is something that we all need in the long journey towards a sustainable future.
Key objectives for aesthetics and quality
In design education, you quickly learn that people are more attracted to aesthetically pleasing objects and experiences. Perception of beauty has a fast influence on our choices like if to engage with something or not.
A pleasing aesthetic of the installation and the shown visuals were key elements in the design process of Landshapes. It needed to be attractive and intriguing from far to catch people’s attention and motivate them to approach and to interact, and at the same time fulfill created expectations up close. Polished wood is used to construct the installation, as it can catch and reflect light while simultaneously being warm and inviting to the touch.
I put a big emphasis on the aesthetic and visual quality of the projected images. Earth imagery taken from space possesses an unmistakable beauty, and I collected a custom dataset of thousands of high-resolution satellite images from ESA’s SENTINEL-2 mission to train the underlying artificial intelligence. The output of the trained network is high in resolution and can generate gorgeous transitions between fictional landscapes.
When designing experience, I also put a lot of care into shaping the interaction with the installation, as it strongly impacts the perceived aesthetic. I wanted it to feel natural, pleasing and inviting while respecting the choice to remain passive as a visitor. A smooth, pushable handle, following the shape of the railing, allows the visitor to become an active participant in the installation, to move along with the changing artwork, stop its changing, and experience their potential impact on our surroundings in a playful, open-ended manner. However, this active interaction is not required, but each visitor can shape the experience to their liking, either by passively observing or actively engaging – there is no right or wrong.
In a first evaluation, Landshapes participants described it as a beautiful, engaging, and overall pleasant experience.
Key objectives for inclusion
Landshapes is an installation meant for the public, and to be used and interacted with by everyone. The design process that resulted in the installation piece used an iterative approach, that included weekly tests with participants to ensure that the concept was understandable, appealing to, and usable by everyone.
The underlying satellite data to train the AI was collected from purely public sources – more concretely ESA’s SENTINEL-2 mission. The dataset includes no selected and popular locations, but sources its data from all over the world – no matter if the country of origin lies in Europe, tropical islands most endangered by climate change or a desert in Africa. This stands in stark contrast to the world represented in most climate debates where wealthy and predominantly western nations tend to be overrepresented in terms of decision-making power.
The installation and surrounding exhibition experience were designed with accessibility in mind. All climate stories will be illustrated and voiced in various languages to be accessible for young and illiterate visitors.
Furthermore, I have plans to publish the design, underlying data, and climate stories as an open-source project as well as conceptualize an affordable screen-only version. My hope is that this will enable exhibition spaces and art festivals with limited financial means to adapt Landshapes for their purposes.
The whole project is built upon public data and is equally meant to be given back to the public.
Physical or other transformations
Innovative character
In my view, Landshapes unifies the three different dimensions of sustainability, aesthetics, and inclusion beautifully. The concept uses public data, aesthetically pleasing experiences, and interactive participation to foster fascination for our climate. The experience can lead to a curious and long-lasting shift in mindset that enables us to participate in climate discussions and needed actions not only from a perspective of fearful necessity but a sustainable wonder for our surrounding climate.
What makes Landshapes unique is that it does not try to push a given agenda. It does not try to say that this speculative future is good, that this one is bad, that there is only one correct answer. Each visitor experience is inimitable, as each generated image and each reaction towards it are truly unique. The AI – trained on images from all around our world – functions as a neutral mediator of the experience. With the potential to depict any possible landscape, it is not the designer who imposes a particular vision of a speculative future, but the creation being the result of a collaboration between the machine and the guiding visitor.
The project originated not from a thought of profitability, but a place of free research and curiosity for the unknown. The positive reactions towards the aesthetic output abilities of the installation’s AI even led to the origin of a whole new research group at the Delft University of Technology. In that group, Landshapes is now used by design students to research the aesthetic output of Artificial Intelligence.
