318 Int. J. Advanced Intelligence Paradigms, Vol. 1, No. 3, 2009 Copyright © 2009 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd. Biological motifs designed using the principles of artificial life Penesta Dika Institute of Interface Cultures, Department for Media Studies, University of Art and Industrial Design, Linz, Austria E-mail: penesta@gmx.net Abstract: Whereas digitalised art plants and animals have been designed using algorithms imitating the natural rules of creating a living being, in interactive media art, their virtual development, growth and death are simulated based on the visitors’ interactivity. Virtual worlds, which are developed through the rules of the artists, enable a redefining of the rules through the users. The users can create virtual worlds that even the artists have not yet imagined. To realise this, evolutionary, and, in particular, genetic algorithms are used. Keywords: designing biological motifs; interactive media art; artificial life; genetic algorithms. Reference to this paper should be made as follows: Dika, P. (2009) ‘Biological motifs designed using the principles of artificial life’, Int. J. Advanced Intelligence Paradigms, Vol. 1, No. 3, pp.318–331. Biographical notes: Penesta Dika received her Master’s Degree in Philosophy from the Institute of Art History at the Vienna University (Austria) with the thesis: “Die Computerkunst Herbert W. Frankes” (Computer – Art of Herbert W. Franke) in 2003. Her thesis was published as a book by Logos Berlin in honour of the 80th birthday of Herbert W. Franke. Currently, she is a Doctoral Degree candidate in Philosophy at “Kunstuniversität Linz” (Austria), Institute for Interface Culture, under the supervision of Professor Christa Sommerer and Professor Oliver Grau. The title of her thesis is “Visual Motifs in Interactive Media Art”. 1 Introduction The aspect of the usage of principles of nature, in particular, creating art imitating the rules of nature, is widespread in interactive media art. The fact that it is possible to programme works based on such rules has been presented here, and this is significant for the development of artworks. For example, the so-called genetic algorithm (see Holland, 1975; Goldberg, 1989), which is a type of evolutionary algorithm, is used in interactive artworks, which are discussed in this paper. Genetic algorithms are algorithms used for optimisation problems and are based on Charles Darwin’s evolutionary theory and the principle of the “survival of the fittest”. The main rules on which they are based are selection, reproduction, crossover and mutation. The different usage of such algorithms brought appropriate visual characteristics. Considering the