it’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s funny weather! by theo triantafyllidis

In conversation with Theo Triantafyllidis

In Theo Triantafyllidis’s video-based installation, Funny Weather, software-generated birds, planes, and clouds drift across a dreamy sky. At any point, the weather can turn gray, a flock can burst across the screen, or a kite can whip into view. To create this work, the artist draws on real-time data local to Manchester, where the installation is presented, to generate an uncanny AI-powered simulation of the world outside the exhibition space. Funny Weather, which premieres in mid-November at Aviva Studios in the UK, will travel to Hong Kong, Melbourne, and New York. In each new city, the work will draw on local data, creating a site-specific reflection of the weather in that location.

In conversation with designboom, Triantafyllidis revealed the APIs he worked with, the parallels between weather forecasting and divination, and how weather is becoming ‘the main character’. On first receiving the commission, which will travel between four international hosts, he notes, ‘I had this idea of a weather oracle or this strange weather prediction machine as a start.’

APIs for Birds, Planes, and rainy days

To create Funny Weather, Triantafyllidis drew on three data sets. The first was the Open-Meteo API, which provides weather information: blue skies, overcast conditions, and impending thunderstorms. The next was a flight radar that reported which flights were passing over Aviva Studios. The last, which Triantafyllidis admits was the ‘most interesting’ to work with, was eBird and Merlin Bird ID – tools that track and identify bird sightings. The sightings are self-reported by users, making them a very subjective data set to work with. He notes that the data collected in eBird is ‘a way of digitizing nature that is very personal and strange. It has a bit of competitiveness to it and a bit of true love for what people are looking at.’

‘These are getting pulled daily and within intervals and fed into our custom system,’ says Triantafyllidis of how this data is translated into the visuals seen on screen. ‘With each of these three data streams, we’re [feeding] into different components of the system and driving different things.’

The divinity of predictive models

Although he admits that these data sets feel disparate, the artist says he is creating a kind of uncanny universe. He explains, ‘what I’m trying to do is give this data to a custom language model that we’re running and ask it to [prophesize] based on this data.’ Inside Funny Weather is what Factory International describes as a ‘bespoke locally hosted AI Oracle’ that generates the environment within the simulation. Although powered by the latest technology, the process reflects a kind of ancient logic. Triantafyllidis says it is ‘like looking back at how forecasting and divination worked in earlier human history, when maybe people were more in tune with weather and natural patterns and the general flow of things.’ He calls the task he gives the program a ‘nonsensical premise’ when considering the seemingly arbitrary selection of bird, weather, and flight-path data points. But by merging this information and transforming it into a visual landscape, he hopes that it will ‘tell us something useful and meaningful about our future.’

Can we predict the future? Or at least the weather?

When talking about the installation at Aviva Studios, the artist notes that ‘sometimes the weather of our system aligns with what we see outside.’ He describes the lobby where the massive screen sits, continually morphing in response to Funny Weather and the data fed into it. ‘You can’t see the sky exactly,’ he says of the Manchester space, ‘but you can get the sense of what’s the weather outside. And here is a system [Funny Weather] attempting to align itself with the weather outside – sometimes successfully, sometimes not so successfully.’ The data itself is sometimes a bit wonky or inaccurate, causing what Triantafyllidis calls ‘stress’ in the environment. He says that sometimes there will be an influx of planes or ‘there [will be] birds that are not supposed to be there either – too early for the season or very unique, rare birds that are not seen in the area very frequently. This will affect the mood of the system.’

The weather as main character

‘I think climate change is such a hyper object that is very tough for the human mind to comprehend,’ says Triantafyllidis on the urgency of the themes in his work. ‘We’ve reached a tipping point with the instability of the weather where we’re starting to experience really crazy shifts and weird meteorological phenomena happening on a very day-to-day basis and in every part of the world.’ He goes on to talk about the increased frequency of these extreme climate patterns and how, inevitably, the weather will become ‘this main character in our lives.’ Funny Weather acknowledges this inevitability: ‘I’m trying to imagine a good way to let the weather be the narrator of these stories, giving it this strange voice that can communicate somehow through this weird system.’

project info:

name: Funny Weather

artist: Theo Triantafyllidis | @theo.trian

presented by: Factory International in collaboration with Australian Centre for the Moving Image, Onassis ONX, and M+

locations: Media Wall at Aviva Studios, home of Factory International, Manchester

dates: November 11–December 6, 2026, and January 19–March 26, 2027

This article is part of designboom’s POSTHUMAN UTOPIAS chapter, exploring what happens when humans are no longer the measure of all things. These stories rethink our relationship with the planet through interspecies architecture, living materials, regenerative landscapes and emerging technologies – learn more here! The chapter is presented in partnership with INDX|GLOBAL – a global cultural platform placing Indian architecture, design, and creative intelligence in conversation with the world.

Each designboom editorial series explores one theme in depth through projects, interviews, features and news across architecture, design, art and technology. Discover more chapters here, and get in touch if you’d like to submit a story through our submissions portal or contact form.