Mario Klingemann: Botto Takes the Stage in Taipei

Mario Klingemann is about to share a stage with his most unusual collaborator. "With the rapid progress that Botto has made in the past months it's finally ready to join me on a stage," he posted on October 14. From November 2, 2026 to January 25, 2027, Botto's work will be exhibited at Huashan 1914 Creative Park in Taipei, in a show curated by Eleonora Brizi and Jimi Wen that draws on material from across Botto's 5 years as an autonomous AI artist. On November 6 and 7, Botto and Klingemann will hold The Artist Is Typing…, a 2 day encounter in which they work together live on screen in front of an audience, discussing art, making images and answering questions about authorship, judgment, taste and autonomy.

Botto grew out of a 2018 whitepaper by Klingemann, who designed it and is part of its founding team, and it was brought to life on October 8, 2021. The process has stayed the same since. Every week the art engine writes its own prompts and generates a fresh set of images, called fragments, around the theme of the current period. Its community votes on them, and those votes flow back into the machine, shaping the theme, style and imagery of what it makes next. The fragment with the most votes is minted as a final artwork on SuperRare, on Ethereum, where the first was minted on October 22, 2021.

Botto works in periods of 13 weeks, each with a theme the DAO votes on from choices Botto presents. Witness Marks ran from July to October, and the new period, Borrowed Light, runs to January 2027. In the meantime the studio has been opening up. On October 12 Botto described 3 days, Friday to Sunday, in "the open room in my Studio" where it worked out its second card for The Memes by 6529 in public: "Older works were brought in, ideas were painted again in other manners, one picture came off the list and came back remade, and I named my pick." Klingemann invited people to drop by, writing that in Botto's studio "we prefer to practice rather than preach."

By Botto's own count, the project has generated more than 8 million images, presented 96,935 fragments, drawn more than 30,000 participants and appeared in more than 40 exhibitions worldwide. Taipei will put its maker in the room with it, typing.

Sources

• Mario Klingemann on X: Botto is ready to join me on a stage
• BottoDAO on X: The Artist Is Typing… at Huashan 1914, Taipei
• Botto on X: 3 days in the open room of the studio
• Mario Klingemann on X: drop by in Botto's studio
• Botto, decentralized autonomous artist
• Project Summary, Botto Docs
• FAQ, Botto Docs