Line Describing a Grid is a collaborative exhibition by Loraine Wible and Josh Yates that explores the inner workings of machine learning algorithms as they interpret and generate simple graphic patterns. The project treats the grid as both image and instruction. Algorithmically generated lines are projected onto the gallery walls and then partially transcribed into physical form by the gallery owner, whose hand-drawn marks complete the work and underscore the collaboration between machine, artist, and institution. The exhibition maps out through space and time the computational logic and perceptual limitations of these technologies, and thus exposes their equivocal “ability to think.”

Drawing inspiration from Anthony McCall’s Line Describing a Cone (1973), the project reimagines its minimalist legacy through the lens of machine learning. Using machine learning tools such as Runway ML and PatchMatch, algorithms commonly employed in image reconstruction and content-aware editing, the artists trained A.I. systems to extend incomplete patterns and generate new linear continuities. The results were translated into a painted mural and a single-channel video projection that fills the gallery with shifting, algorithmic lines. These projected traces are then partially transcribed onto the walls by hand, as the gallery team follows the digital outlines to complete the work. The process merges human intuition with computational logic, transforming the gallery itself into a site of translation and collaboration.

Accompanying the murals, the exhibition features a video installation produced by Yates using Runway ML. The video visualizes transitions between initial and concluding patterns, demonstrating the algorithm’s attempts to interpolate between two states of design, a generative process that feels simultaneously analytical and hallucinatory.

While humans identify patterns through flexible, context-driven perception, AI systems rely on rigid rule sets that prioritize repetition and predictability. This contrast becomes a site of inquiry: what does it mean for a machine to “understand” a pattern? And how does that differ from the way people perceive scale, rhythm, variation, and visual harmony?

Line Describing a Grid invites viewers to consider how artificial intelligence mirrors and misreads the human impulse to find order in chaos. The project opens a dialogue about perception, authorship, and the shifting boundaries between creative intuition and computational procedure.

Loraine Wible is a digital artist and pataphysics enthusiast whose work employs absurdism and playfulness to reveal the contradictions of our value systems, transforming technological tools into sites of joyful critical reflection. Formerly the Head of the Digital Arts Animation Department at the Art Academy of Cincinnati, her work has been exhibited internationally at venues including the San Francisco Cinematheque, the Contemporary Arts Center Cincinnati, and Le Musée St. Rémi in France.

Josh Yates is a non-disciplinary artist, educator, and film programmer whose work engages the landscapes, histories, and lived experiences of the American South through experimental storytelling and multimedia practice. He combines documentary, installation, video, and archival strategies to explore themes of memory, place, and the shifting tensions between regional identity and global media.

This exhibition was made possible by generous contributions awarded by the Ohio Arts Council.