REAS

MICROIMAGE

These works, spanning prints and software, approach drawing without the hand. Developed between 2001 and 2005 and conceptually extended in Phototaxis in 2021, they investigate how lines can be generated, accumulated, and transformed through minimal rules. In this way, the act of drawing is shifted into an allographic register: instructions define the work, and software carries it out. Simulations of minimal biological machines trace lines that build into fields and structures, producing images not as expressions of gesture, but as records of a system in motion.

The shared foundation for this group of works is artificial life research from the 1980s and 1990s, particularly Valentino Braitenberg’s book Vehicles: Experiments in Synthetic Psychology. Braitenberg demonstrated how conceptual machines capable of executing the simplest of sensory and motor connections—move, turn, avoid, follow—could produce behavior that appeared lifelike. All of the works in the MicroImage series—Path, Tissue, MicroImage, and Phototaxis—are built on variations of the same code inspired by these principles. Each project stages drawing as a kind of synthetic performance, enacted by simulated machines whose behavior is simple in isolation but complex in aggregate.

The resulting effect of the series is emergence: complexity arising from simplicity, and order discovered rather than imposed. Lines swarm, overlap, and diverge to generate forms that resemble both the microscopic and the cosmic. Taken together, these works present drawing as a generative act—an event within systems, always unfolding, and never fully determined in advance.

Path

The Path series, first exhibited in 2001, marks the beginning of Reas’ inquiry into drawing with code. The works are generated by simple machines simulated in software, which use Braitenberg-inspired rules to move across a surface, leaving linear traces as they go. The result is line formations that appear organic, but which are entirely the product of instructions.

At the time when the Path series was created, the full vision for the imagined artwork could not be realized. Computer screens were too coarse in resolution, and processors were too slow to render dense accumulations of lines without stutter. Therefore, the prints provided a way to expose the clarity of the system by freezing moments of a generative process in sharp detail, at scales far beyond what a screen could display.

Path 09, 2001.

Detail of path 09. 2001.

Years later, as technology improved, Reas revisited the software. Path (Software 1) and Path (Software 2) (2001/2014) returned to the original code once computers could render the system in real time. These versions are pared down to black-and-white with few lines, emphasizing the motion and form of each trajectory.

Together, the prints and software show how Path occupied a pivotal moment: prints made the system visible at a scale and resolution beyond early screens, while the later software revealed its temporal qualities in real time. As the earliest stage of this larger inquiry, Path demonstrates how simple rules can open onto different modes of experience depending on the medium of display.

Installation view of Path AT BITFORMS GALLERY, 2015.

Tissue

The Tissue series (2002–2005) extends the logic of Path by shifting from trajectories to structures that resemble organic surfaces. Built on the same Vehicles-inspired code, the system emphasizes clustering and permeability: as simulated machines respond to invisible points in the environment, their lines overlap and recombine into semi-transparent layers that suggest growth and accumulation.

Tissue B-01, 2002.

Installation view of tissue prints at bitforms gallery, 2002.

Forty prints—organized into five sets of eight—were exhibited in a grid, with each row showing one variation of the system. In the gallery, these were paired with an interactive software installation where visitors could reposition points within the program as a way to indirectly influence the unfolding patterns. This combination made visible both the fixed clarity of selected moments, and the instability of a system in motion.

Where Path emphasizes linear traces, Tissue generates porous surfaces that feel atmospheric and continuous. It shifts the register of drawing from diagram to environment, opening the work to new spatial and perceptual associations.

MicroImage

MicroImage (2003–2008) expands the explorations of Tissue by dramatically increasing the number of simulated machines, and the density of their traces. Where Tissue emphasized local interaction, MicroImage scales the system until the surface becomes a dense field. As thousands of lines accumulate, new formations emerge: clusters, swarms, and textures that oscillate between microscopic and cosmic registers.

Microimage A-05, 2002.

Microimage A-04, 2002.

Microimage A-06, 2002.

The software in MicroImage runs continuously, with machines interacting in real time to create ever-changing surfaces. To extend perception beyond the limits of live rendering, prints were made at high resolution, freezing states of the system with detail unavailable on early screens. The project also includes animations that expand the process even further, increasing the number of machines from thousands to hundreds of thousands as a way to shift perception from line and motion to immersive volume.

MicroImage demonstrates emergence at its most pronounced within this group. From the same minimal rules that generated Path and Tissue, entirely new phenomena appear at scale. The resulting images suggest natural systems without representing them directly—visualizations of behavior rather than depictions of form.

Phototaxis

Phototaxis (2021) returns to the systems first explored in Path, Tissue, and MicroImage, while refining them with two decades of distance. The title refers to the tendency of organisms to move toward or away from light, grounding the project in its artificial-life lineage. As in the earlier projects, images emerge from simulated machines following minimal rules, with their coordinates joined into lines that accumulate over time.

Stills from Phototaxis, 2022.
What distinguishes Phototaxis from other works in MicroImage is its range. Some works unfold as sparse lattices, where lines drift into open structures, while others condense into dense atmospheres that resemble turbulence. Rather than committing to a single register, the project demonstrates how the same system can generate both delicacy and saturation, diagram and field. The variety reflects both the persistence of the original code, and the refinements shaped by two decades of practice.

The project also marked a shift in presentation. Initially written in C++ and later ported to Processing, the code was reworked in 2021 and translated into p5.js for release through Art Blocks. Each of the 1,000 minted editions fixed one interpretation of the system at the moment of minting while pointing back to the open process behind it. In this way, Phototaxis extended the long arc of drawing with code—rooted in artificial life, articulated through prints, software, and animation, and now situated within blockchain-based generative media.

Braitenberg’s Vehicles

At the core of these works is Valentino Braitenberg’s 1984 book Vehicles: Experiments in Synthetic Psychology. The book presents a sequence of conceptual models, each describing a simple vehicle with basic sensors and motors wired together in different configurations. Although entirely hypothetical, these diagrams demonstrated how minimal structures could generate the appearance of lifelike behavior. Braitenberg called this “synthetic psychology”: the study of how personality and complexity might emerge from the simplest rules.

Reas first encountered Vehicles while studying at MIT, in an Artificial Intelligence course taught by Rodney Brooks. The book offered a framework that directly shaped his earliest software-based drawings. Translating Braitenberg’s diagrams into code, he created simulated machines that could move, turn, and respond to their environments. Each drawing system—Path, Tissue, MicroImage, and Phototaxis—is an extension of this premise.

Given their machine-drawn origin, lines in these systems are not gestures, but rather traces of behavior. Each one inscribes the history of a software machine as it reacts to its environment, connecting moment to moment into a continuous trajectory. Types of machines are coded as distinct colors: if a drawing system uses four types of machine, the resulting image contains four color channels. Similarly, the saturation of each line reflects its speed, with fast motion producing vivid intensity and slow motion producing pale tones. In this way, the works operate as diagrams as well as images—mapping unseen rules, behaviors, and environmental conditions into visual codes.

Through software, what Braitenberg devised as thought experiments became kinetic drawing systems: open frameworks where minimal rules yield emergent images to bridge conceptual models of life with the visual language of generative art.

Emergent Drawing

Across these works, drawing is redefined as a generative system rather than a manual action. Each series shows how minimal rules, enacted through software, can produce forms that feel alive without directly imitating nature. Prints freeze moments of possibility, software enacts them in real time, and animations extend them into immersive durations.

From Path to Tissue to MicroImage, and later Phototaxis, the lineage is clear: all works emerge from the same conceptual grounding in Vehicles, and from artificial life research. What shifts between each series is scale, medium, and context. The machines remain simple, but their images grow in complexity as their numbers multiply, their environments change, and their outputs are distilled for print, projection, or generative edition.

Overall, this body of work positions drawing as an event within systems—lines become traces of emergent behavior, and compositions become diagrams of interaction. It defines a practice where the hand is absent, yet images remain charged with an energy and presence that is discovered as rules unfold over time.

Related Artworks
Browse the MicroImage category on the REAS INDEX.

Further Exploration
Braitenberg, Valentino. Vehicles: Experiments in Synthetic Psychology. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1984.

Brooks, Rodney. Cambrian Intelligence: The Early History of the New AI. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1999.

Mitchell Whitelaw. Metacreation: Art and Artificial Life. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2004.

Reas, Casey. “Tissue.” In CODE: The Language of Our Time, edited by Gerfried Stocker and Christine Schöpf, 302–303. Ostfildern-Ruit: Hatje Cantz, 2003.

Reas, Casey. “Beyond Code.” In Network Practices: New Strategies in Architecture and Design, edited by Anthony Burke and Therese Tierney, 166–177. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2007.

Reas, Casey. “Notes on ‘Phototaxis’.” Medium. September 18, 2021. https://medium.com/@REAS/notes-on-phototaxis-db7aa7641ad8. Accessed August 28, 2025.

Selected Exhibition History
With A Little Help From My Friends. Charlie James Gallery. Los Angeles, CA. 14 September – 26 October 2019. MicroImage A-02. [E-19-07]

Augmenting Creativity. Nanjing University. Nanjing, China. 3 – 15 November 2019. Curated by Jason Bailey. MicroImage (Software 1). [E-19-08]

ArchiLab. FRAC Centre. Orléans, France. 14 September 2013 – 2 February 2014. Process 13, MicroImage prints and software. [E-13-12]

Void loop. Antenna Gallery. New Orleans, LA. 10 August – 8 September 2013. MicroImage software, Path software. [E-13-10]

Rethinking Typologies. The Art Institute of Chicago. Chicago, IL. 3 March – 29 July 2012. Tissue. [E-12-04]

MR.xpo 22 _ C.E.B. Reas. MediaRuimte. Brussels, Belgium. 10 – 29 November 2008. <>TAG presents The Protean Image and MicroImage at MediaRuimte as part of the Cimatics festival. [E-08-17]

eLandscapes. Zendai Museum of Modern Art. Shanghai, China. 19 October – 16 November 2008. Curated by Richard Castelli. MicroImage software as a large projection. [E-08-16]

Algorists 2008. Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics (KITP), University of California, Santa Barbara. Santa Barbara, CA. Opened 25 September 2008. MicroImage prints. [E-08-14]

Our Distance from Things. Telic Arts Exchange. Los Angeles, CA. 17 March – 7 April 2007. MicroImage video. [E-07-01]

ARTEFACT Festival. STUK Arts Centre. Leuven, Belgium. 13 – 18 February 2006. MicroImage software as a projection. [E-06-02]

Living Culture. Eyebeam. New York, NY. 27 July 2006. MicroImage video. [E-06-05]

Microwave International Media Art Festival. Hong Kong, China. 28 October – 20 November 2004. Seoul A, Seoul B, MicroImage. [E-04-07]

Runtime Art. Multimedia Institute. Zagreb, Croatia. 1 – 6 June 2004. MicroImage. [E-04-06]

Art Brussels, One Man Show. Brussels, Belgium. 1 – 5 April 2004. MicroImage. [E-04-02]

Seven Wonders. Chromosome Gallery. Berlin, Germany. 12 December 2003. MicroImage. [E-03-06]

Cluster. Mole Antonelliana. Turin, Italy. November 2003. MicroImage, Tissue, Articulate. [E-03-04]

CODE. Ars Electronica. Linz, Austria. 7 – 9 September 2003. MicroImage, Tissue. [E-03-03]

Abstraction Now. Künstlerhaus Wien. Vienna, Austria. 29 August – 28 September 2003. MicroImage, Articulate. [E-03-02]

Danish Film Institute. Copenhagen, Denmark. May 2003. MicroImage, Seed, Mediation videos. [E-03-01]

Digital Showcase 18. AMODA. Austin, TX. 10 December 2002. MicroImage, Mediation animation. [E-02-02]

The Art of Code: Golan Levin and Casey Reas. bitforms gallery. New York, NY. 21 February – 30 March 2002. Tissue, Seed, RPM. (Two-person exhibition.) [S-01]

Bitforms Inaugural Group Show. bitforms gallery. New York, NY. 15 November – 2 December 2001. Path prints. [E-01-04]