# aurèce vettier, plant breeder - Title: aurèce vettier, plant breeder - Content type: Curatorial text - Language: en - Canonical URL: https://aurecevettier.com/en/bibliography/curatorial-texts/aurece-vettier-plant-breeder - Published: 2026-09-10T14:13:16+00:00 - Updated: 2026-09-10T14:13:16+00:00 ## Details - Author: Henri Guette - Year: 2022 - Original publication: Text originally published in the literary journal Sève, edited by Vidya Narine, in September 2022. ## Main content For aurèce vettier, the digital is not an end in itself. By approaching artificial intelligence as an interlocutor, the artistic studio founded by Paul Mouginot in 2019 embraces a hybrid practice, one that is always ready to produce new offshoots. aurèce vettier’s herbariums possess a photographic sharpness reminiscent of Karl Blossfeldt’s work. By isolating details—a budding shoot, the delicacy of a stem, the curve of a leaf—his oil paintings appear to belong to a tradition of scientific observation. Yet the scientific dimension is not where one might expect it. It lies in the code. These highly ornamental plants are not real, and could probably not exist without the computer that generates them. They acquire their plausibility through an algorithm that composes from databases and real herbarium specimens, yet they are cultivated, so to speak, as anomalies. A plant breeder is someone who devotes their time to creating new varieties, most commonly associated with roses. The aim may be to produce more fragrant flowers or more resilient plants, but in horticulture, the motivations are often primarily aesthetic—the same motivations that drive aurèce vettier and lead him to complete his works by hand with brushes, giving them a material existence beyond the screen. Cultivars—varieties created through human intervention—can become more fragile precisely because of the qualities for which they are sought. A double row of petals, for instance, may discourage pollinating insects, rendering the flower sterile and unable to reproduce without manual intervention. aurèce vettier’s creations maintain a similar relationship with rarity. They are unique because they emerge from a selection made among hundreds of possibilities generated by artificial intelligence. They are also unique because they result from a dialogue between different hands and forms of intelligence: those of the programmer, the painter or sculptor, and, of course, that of the generative entity itself. At no point is the intention to simply let “*the computer spit out artworks*,” as aurèce vettier puts it. Beyond the conceptual dimension, he instead claims a sensitive, material approach that extends all the way to the making of objects. The herbariums may thus continue into sculpture, reproducing a branch or a new shoot. The work is enriched through traditional techniques and materials such as bronze and painting. A child of digital culture and closely connected to contemporary technology-minded communities, aurèce vettier has a clear idea of how such approaches might be renewed through a greater degree of hybridity, both conceptually and formally. While many artists working with code focus on its writing, developing artificial intelligence through the construction of datasets before allowing the machine to operate autonomously, aurèce vettier seeks to extend collaboration beyond the protocol itself. As he emphasises, the algorithms he uses are not necessarily the newest or the most complex, but rather those that leave the greatest room for back-and-forth exchange with the human. There is, indeed, a genuine notion of dialogue with artificial intelligence. It requires time to learn and to be adjusted. It must first be fed with a dataset, as broad or as specific as possible, so that it can begin to grasp subtleties—and then it must be practised, almost like an instrument. Every programmer develops according to their own individuality, and the simpler the algorithm, the more clearly the sensibility of the person behind it can be perceived. There is therefore no reason to fear for the question of authorship—quite the opposite. “*The algorithm is an engine for writing, a way of propelling creation forward,*” explains aurèce vettier. Thus, when he begins writing poems, and later sets himself the task of completing René Daumal’s unfinished novel *Mount Analogue*, he does so with something of the Surrealists’ enthusiasm for automatic writing. Like automatic writing, the algorithm can offer a means of accessing the unconscious. And through the interplay of translations between English—the dominant language of computing—and French, it becomes possible to compose while simultaneously retaining a state of complete lucidity. aurèce vettier’s most recent works might suggest an affinity with Surrealism. This resemblance is deceptive: their point of departure is simply his dreams. By attempting to translate them into images through algorithms, he deliberately blurs the boundaries and even surprises himself. Technology extends human dreams and enriches them. Through his working process and his performances as a public writer, aurèce vettier explores new modes of interaction with both audiences and technology. In doing so, he places himself within a lineage of artists who, following Barthes and his essay on the death of the author, abandon the idea of the solitary artistic genius in order to more fully affirm our collective capacity for creation. Note: In botany, a plant breeder is a person who creates a cultivar—a new plant variety—whether by chance or through deliberate selection. ## Relationships ### Related exhibitions - [Circular Ruins](https://aurecevettier.com/en/exhibitions/circular-ruins.md) ## Official references - [Author website](https://henriguette.fr/)