Andrew Tricaso Explores 90s Nostalgia using Playform AI in “Artificial Fermentation”

Inspired by the relationship between fermentation and artificial intelligence, digital artist Andrew Tricaso presents Artificial Fermentation, exclusively on OpenSea.

Created using Playform AI, the artist inputted a selection of street/fashion photographs from a 90’s Japanese Magazine called “Fruits,” and found that the process of creating works with AI were adjacent to cultivating and fermenting. Artificial Fermentation will be available on OpenSea as 10 select NFT works. Once collected, the NFT will unlock a limited GIF.

Playform Studio Manager Mirabelle Alan sat down with Andrew Tricaso to discuss Artificial Fermentation.

Mirabelle: Can you tell me about Artificial Fermentation and the process of creating this body of work with Playform?

Andrew: Artificial Fermentation is comparing the process of inputting work through the AI software with the natural process of fermentation; they’re both very similar in their processes. A general definition of fermentation would be something being changed or grown through a process. 

M: For someone who isn’t familiar with the science behind fermentation, could you summarize what it means and what it does?

A: From my understanding, there’s two types of fermentation: There’s the oxygen process which involves oxygen, and then there’s one that doesn’t involve oxygen - it’s sealed off from its surroundings. This is the type of process that I learned towards. Once you have this material and it’s sealed off from oxygen, it begins to change and grow into something else. I found that there was a comparison between the fermentation process and Playform AI process; once you put an image through the AI, it’s sealed off - it’s out of your hands, it’s up to the process at that point. Then after that process is complete, after that AI fermentation has finished training, it’s yours to use. But you have to accept that for a period of time, it’s out of your hands and growing or changing on its own prerogative. 

M: So what does your AI fermentation process look like, how do you cultivate art through AI?

A: A lot of my creation process is going through my own archive of works, but for this exhibition I wanted to try something different, so I stumbled upon these images from a 90s Japanese Street Fashion magazine called “Fruits,” and that’s really where this body of work began. 

M: Tell me about this magazine, and then how it led to the final project. 

A: I was scrolling through the internet, and I found scanned images of vintage magazines, and I found a particular page that really spoke to me. It was very of its time, very 90s, and so I wanted to see how it would translate through the AI software. 

M: Is there something in particular that resonates with you about the 90s?

A: I don’t remember much of the 90s, but for my last exhibition that I participated in with Playform Studio, AI Dreams of Web 3.0, the idea of nostalgia and early computers in the 90s influenced my work. The idea there was inputting old computers into new computers, using this new AI technology.

M: I wonder what it is about the 90s that you’re drawn to, and that you continue to come back to in your work?

A: I think mostly I’m drawn to the nostalgia factor. I work in a music store, so I’m constantly around vintage things, and also around people using vintage things in new ways.

M: For someone who just started using Playform, do you have any advice or recommendations for creating?

A: Take advantage of all there is to offer on the software. Experiment, use the collections of available works from the community, and experiment.