A Natural History of Networks: Taxonomy (2024) is a series of nine prints produced using Softmachine – an experimental electrochemical fluid-metal-based computing and performance device/instrument. The larger project explores the intersection of material intelligence, emergent systems, and the aesthetics of complex systems. Each image in the series is generated by applying varying electrical currents and encoded stimulation patterns into a dynamic medium of fluid metal and reactive chemical solutions.

The process initiates a self-organizing growth akin to biological systems: net-like, fractal, and dendritic structures begin to emerge organically over time, guided not by a predetermined design but by the interplay between physical forces and electrical signals. These forms echo natural morphogenetic processes found in neural networks, root systems, or mineral crystallization – producing visual artifacts that resemble maps of unseen systems or the fossilized memory of energy flow.

A Natural History of Networks Taxonomy proposes an archival approach to these phenomena, treating them as if they were biological or geological findings – mapping a new terrain where computation behaves not like a rigid machine but like a living, evolving system.