Travis LeRoy Southworth

Lives and works in NYC, NY, USA

Artist statement

Omnia Ludens—Latin for “everything in play”—reflects upon authenticity and artifice within contemporary image creation and artificial intelligence. Historically, printer test images were crafted as precise tools to calibrate mechanical reproduction, from Kodak’s mid-20th-century “Shirley” cards to today’s digitally composited calibration mosaics. These standardized patterns of color and form, originally designed to perfect photographic and digital printing accuracy, reveal deeper implications about cultural biases, standardization, and control in visual reproduction. In Omnia Ludens, I repurpose these calibration outputs as input prompts for AI diffusion models, using their carefully structured arrangements to explore neural-network-generated unpredictability and creative reinterpretation. Here, printer test images serve as metaphors for both mechanical precision and the fragmented, chaotic potentials of AI-driven art. My appropriation of these ubiquitous, often overlooked calibration tools underscores a contemporary reality where images continually shift between authenticity and fabrication, inviting reflection on the fluid boundaries of originality in an era defined by infinite digital mutability. This approach aligns with a broader tradition of appropriation art, particularly within photography, where artists have long borrowed, recontextualized, and transformed existing imagery to challenge notions of authorship, originality, and cultural meaning. The vast datasets...

Artwork