Jonas Lund: Most Valuable Painting Reaches Its Final Generations on Feral File
Jonas Lund completes MVP (Most Valuable Painting), the self-optimizing painting project that had sat at Generation 450 since 2022, in a Feral File solo exhibition.
Jonas Lund is finishing a work four years in the making. Most Valuable Painting, his solo exhibition on Feral File curated by Nora O' Murchú, completes MVP (Most Valuable Painting), a project commissioned by Aorist in 2022 that set out to produce 512 generations of digital paintings through optimization and collective decision-making, evolving in response to likes, clicks and other forms of engagement. MVP had been sitting at Generation 450 since 2022. On October 3, it started moving again.
Now "the final 64 will go for sale and complete the four year long journey," Lund wrote on X. In her curatorial essay, "ARE YA WINNING, SON?", O' Murchú traces the idea back to Viewer Improved Painting (2014), a self-optimizing painting that used eye tracking to steer its composition toward the most viewed image. She also points to the project's final twist: after 512 generations of measuring, selecting and optimizing, MVP 1 "can never be bought or sold."
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