Opening on October 18th — with a reception from 6-9 PM — and running through late March 2026, Regenerative Symphony is an immersive installation envisioning a future (2030-2050) reliant on recycling critical minerals, challenging current resource-heavy extraction norms. By utilizing AI and generative audio-visual pattern making, the artwork provokes new thinking in regards to materials used in advanced technology and the beauty of reuse.
Symbolically echoing the structure of a traditional symphony, an orchestra’s grand composition, Regenerative Symphony envisions a future where the silent, constant performance of critical minerals — which are essential building blocks for advanced technology — is brought to the fore. In this immersive installation, AI and generative audio-visual patterns transform these unseen elements into an ever-changing chorus, dynamically highlighting the beauty of reuse and challenging the heavy norms of resource extraction. Here, everyday minerals perform new symphonies of regeneration, urging us to rearrange their composition rather than extract more from natural landscapes.
The artwork’s algorithmic model is rooted in the Lotka-Volterra Predator-Prey model. It emphasizes recycling and resource interdependence by simulating interactions among the three main material groups reliant on critical minerals: consumer electronics, renewable energy, and electric transportation. These elements are integrated into an AI architecture, illustrating the cyclic, symbiotic balance within ecosystems. This algorithmic influence extends to the audiovisual elements, shaping their behavior and choreography in a poetic and critical manner. It provides insight into resource exchange and recycling, portraying critical minerals as essential players in the ongoing landscape of regeneration.
This artwork is realized by Studio Above&Below and co-commissioned by MEET Digital Culture Centre with the support of Area Science Park Trieste as part of S+T+ARTS In the City project co-funded by the European Union.
Concept & Design: Studio Above&Below
Production: Studio Above&Below
Computational Programming (AI): Tommaso Rodani, Francesca Cuturello
Sound Design: Einar Fehrholz
Studio Above&Below is a UK-based art and technology practice founded by Daria Jelonek (DE) and Perry-James Sugden (UK) after graduating from the Royal College of Art. Their work combines Mixed Reality experiences (XR), digital art, and data in order to grow potential connections between humans, machines, and the environment — working towards preferred future interactions with our surroundings. Believing in research-based art, Studio Above&Below often works with science, technology, communities, and ecologies to push the boundaries of digital media for future living. Established in 2018, over the last years, the duo has created groundbreaking large-scale public artworks using advanced technologies with live data inputs in order to make invisible phenomena visible and give our environment a voice to express itself.
The duo’s work has been exhibited internationally at institutions such as the Royal Academy, V&A London, Photophore during the Venice Biennale, London Design Festival, MEET Milan, UCCA Shanghai, WRO Biennale, SONAR+D Barcelona, Hyundai Motor studio Beijing, and NRW Forum Düsseldorf.
