Yöti, The Algorithmic Portrait Artist

Yöti is an automated portrait artist that uses salvaged 1980s pen plotters to draw, on actual paper, the likeness of participants using algorithmically-generated squiggly lines. From up close, the portraits look like an abstract collection of linear markings. However, from a distance, the lines clearly reveal Yöti’s interpretation of the visitor’s visage.

Yöti can be thought of as a deconstructed photobooth. Just like the good old analog photobooths, Yöti takes a few minutes to draw a portrait. During this time, visitors can witness their face slowly being drawn on paper by the plotters. The installation invites the visitor to reconsider our relation to anticipation and immediateness. This feels particularly relevant in these times of instant gratification.

By purposefully using « outdated » technologies, the installation also questions our relation to obsolescence, ephemerality and permanence. It also takes interest in our rapport to the physical world. All participants leave with a physical object : a piece of paper bearing their portrait. Virtual, artificial and augmented realities are all fine but sometimes it just feels good to hold on to an actual, tangible object.

About the Artist:

Transforming cultural discard into playful, poetic experiences, Jean-Philippe Côté (a.k.a. djip.co) reimagines obsolete technologies as vibrant, interactive art installations. Drawing upon cast-off devices — from ATM screens, pen plotters and intercom systems to archaic iPhones or security cameras — he leverages custom artisanal software to craft new narratives for the digital and technological refuse societies leave behind. By descripting technical artifacts, his work imagines alternate futures for e-waste and invites the viewer to reconsider its relation to obsolete materialities. Despite this serious undertone, his installations can be interacted with in a playful and poetic way and offer a layered experience, both on the interactive and interpretative levels.

A recurring theme in his work is the mirroring of the visitor’s body and senses. By exhibiting distorted, hybrid, blended, fabulatory and liminal representations of the self, his artworks are underlining the dislocation between who we are and the ways in which we present ourselves in a world heavily mediated by manifold technologies. While Côté is undeniably a hardware tinkerer, it is through software that he brings life into his art. His custom software creations are often released publicly for the benefit of all. This has made him a respected contributor of the open-source community, especially in the fields of creative coding, networked music and physical computing.

Selected by prestigious events such as Ars Electronica, ISEA, Sónar, FILE, Arte Laguna or ADAF, and shown in renowned venues including Venice’s Arsenale, Minneapolis’ Walker Art Center, Montreal’s Museum of Contemporary Art, Gwangju’s Asia Culture Center, or Rio’s Museu do Amanhã, his art resonates across continents.

Côté teaches interactive media at Collège Édouard-Montpetit, holds a master’s degree in communications (experimental media) and is a PhD candidate in the Arts Studies and Practices program of Université du Québec à Montréal.

In blending technical appropriation, software remediation, and algorithmic serendipity, he challenges viewers to imagine alternate futures for the technologies we leave behind.