Editorials

DX Research Group's Poof, LookingForOwls, Patti, Alaska, Stripes, Gremplin, and Octal spoke with Peter Bauman (Monk Antony). They cover the group's experiments with AI agents and crypto, particularly DX Terminal and the new DX Terminal Pro. They discuss how the projects relate to their ideas on the systems economy, plus why AI needs crypto and world-building with complex systems.

What happens when language functions as both medium and mechanic? Alasdair Milne reflects on dmstfctn’s onchain AI text game "Fango 1000," released free-to-play in 2025. Milne argues the work keeps meaning-making human by turning interpretation into onchain governance instead of outsourcing lore to AI. It was conceived and developed as part of the ARTeCHÓ fellowship, following exhibitions of early prototypes at Koelhuis, Eindhoven and Etopia, Zaragoza in 2024.

Droitcour argues contemporary art with NFTs operates in the productive tension between two opposing aesthetics: schizocollage (which foregrounds visible seams and difference) and generative AI (which synthesizes difference into coherent wholes). The most compelling work—Mons and Little Swag World by Supermetal Bosch, as well as Ugly Bitches and Little Darlings by Ann Hirsch and Maya Man—uses this tension to surface and critique how desire, identity and collectibility function in culture.

Lu Yang’s DOKU! DOKU! DOKU!: samsara.exe at Amant in New York, on view through February 15, lands alongside MoMI’s presentation of Lu Yang: The Great Adventure of Material World (2019–20), on view through March 22, 2026. The artist speaks with Peter Bauman (Monk Antony) about solitude as an absolute truth, art as the perfect interdisciplinary cloak, and the illusory boundary between body, avatar, dream and “reality.”

As art shifts from objects to living (continuously executing) systems, institutional infrastructure and capacity must respond. We need living institutions that can preserve conditions of emergence rather than conserving artifacts. Peter Bauman explores how NODE offers one such model, as it showcases these precise capabilities with its opening show, 10,000, by artists Matt Hall and John Watkinson, curated by Amanda Schmitt and produced by Natalie Stone.

Famed investors and art collectors Micky Malka and Becky Kleiner speak with Peter Bauman (Monk Antony), sharing the story of their love for art. They also discuss how an attempt to showcase their own digital collection led to the founding of NODE, a Palo Alto hub designed for living, code-based art through dynamic exhibitions, artist-led presentation and hands-on education that brings new audiences into digital culture. NODE opens January 23, with 10,000, an exhibition by Matt Hall and John Watkinson curated by Amanda Schmitt and produced by Natalie Stone.