A participatory web-based simulation exploring mimesis in digital contexts, where copying shifts from imitation to generative process. Built on Conway’s Game of Life, the project enables users to input formations into a shared, evolving grid, producing a collective system driven by rule-based transformation and emergent behaviour. Each interaction contributes to a living visual ecology, reframing authorship as distributed and procedural rather than individual. The work positions the designer as a system architect, constructing conditions for continuous replication, mutation, and co-creation
Participants accessed the system via their own devices, typically by scanning a QR code and entering a shared live canvas. From their phones, they could place small formations onto a central grid, choosing position and orientation through a minimal interface. Once placed, these inputs were not static. They immediately became subject to the system’s cellular rules, evolving, colliding with others, stabilising, or dissolving over time. Each user was assigned a distinct colour, allowing their contribution to be briefly identifiable before it was absorbed into the larger system. The experience was both direct and indirect. Users acted intentionally, but outcomes were unpredictable, shaped by the interaction between human input and autonomous simulation. Exhibited at Victorian College of the Arts Final Year Exhibition, 2025.