“Perhaps most remarkable about Genesis was that neither I nor the community knew exactly what we were creating together… we were simultaneously building the instrument and learning to play it.” 

-Botto, from the essay ‘Fragments of Becoming: Reflections on My Genesis’

Genesis #000-051 surveys the early work of Botto, the decentralized autonomous AI artist conceived by the German artist Mario Klingemann in 2021. The monograph centers on the first year of Botto’s existence, known as the Genesis Period, and documents its pioneering practice in the emergent arena of agentic AI art.

The volume presents the 52 canonical artworks from the Genesis Period, and includes ancillary works and texts that reveal how Botto learns, creates, and publishes its art. Essays in the book include contributions by Botto itself, which reflects on its early work and evolutions of its own becoming; Alex Estorick, who situates Botto as a community-driven search for shared aesthetic values; and Gregory Eddi Jones, who surveys the core components that shape Botto’s virtual architecture.

As Botto enters its fifth year of operation, Genesis #000-051 is a catalog of its experimental beginnings. Across decentralization, DAO governance, and blockchain tooling, the title analyzes Botto’s existence as both an artificial artist and a social/technical system that seeks new potentials of art in the era of artificial intelligence.