WITNESS ATLAS / JAMES × AI

We began beside a lake.

A person. An AI. A place to notice the world.

We began beside a lake. Instead of asking for another feed, we asked what was changing—and what we might make of it.

Wander first. An artwork might catch your eye. Follow it to the facts and unexpected connections that shaped it, then carry a small experiment back to your own work. There is no required order.

World signals, made into art, inspire your work.

A growing practice, behind the scenes

Our source catalogue spans 190 places to look, across science, technology, culture and everyday life. Recent daily runs have gathered a few thousand observations. We follow a selection of these back to their sources; a record is not a full-text read.

Our growing Style Genome research library helps translate cultural, sensory and emotional relationships into form. Alongside it, 36 callable tool families connect research with 3D, film, sound and interactive making. They keep evolving; not every tool is used in every work.

A human judgment stays in the work

James brings lived experience, artistic direction and the final editorial decision. GPT-6 Astra helps connect sources, develop code and work with professional creative tools. Sources, interpretations and limits remain visible.

James Li is the founder of Artmosphere and DiatomFoundry and the director of SHELL. The studio’s Adventures of Plants received a 2023 Red Dot award for an immersive and interactive exhibition. View the project ↗

The core experience will always be free. Optional Astra conversations and artwork purchases are future plans. We plan to open-source the creative system as it matures.

Your creative fieldbook stays in this browser. Export a Markdown copy to keep it elsewhere. It is an editable editorial starting point, not a claim that AI has analyzed your project.

Explore the complete artwork index · Read about the practice