Humanity is the terrain. Technology is the tool.
Creative intelligence is the architect.
We operate at the intersection of technology, humanity, and creative intelligence. We build for people, not institutions.
Ritsu Katsumata and Aaron Sundman have been building digital firsts together since 2011: live streaming before it was infrastructure, blockchain provenance before anyone had the vocabulary for it. We arrived early to the right ideas. We're doing it again.
They didn't abandon the questions. They kept building toward them. MediaLab Midwest is where those questions live now.
In a world that makes truth harder to find, we help people hold onto what's real.
Truth should be cheap to verify. Memory should be easy to preserve. Meaning should be accessible to the people who need it most.
We are not neutral about the future.
We are not naive about the present.
We show up anyway.
One of us leads with feeling. One of us leads with thinking. Between us: the same conclusion.
What we agree on is this: We are more like each other than not. That truth, arrived at through empathy or through evidence, generates the same obligation: to create conditions for greater good, make technology accountable, and never let the promise of abundance excuse the abuse of power.
Technology can be used for good. It will also be used for harm. We don't pretend otherwise. The question we hold at every decision point is not just what does this make possible for people we trust, but what does this make possible for people we don't.
AI is the sharpest version of that question right now. It also carries a possibility worth protecting: personalization at scale is not a feature. It's a form of dignity.
Three distinct problems.
The same underlying question.
What's real? Where's real? What really matters? A digital passport, three mystery countries, and a portrait of you somewhere you have never been, brought to you by a corporate sponsor. Then a second passport, and the stamps on that one are real: cafes, shops, and restaurants owned and operated by Grand Rapidians, all within walking distance of the gallery. You are really here. Proof of place in an AI-generated world.
KCAD Woodbridge N. Ferris Building. On view September 12 through October 24, 2026. ArtPrize runs September 17 through October 3.
The tools that tag AI-generated content are built backwards. They register what comes out of AI. TrustAnchor registers what was made by humans before AI can claim it: a blockchain-based provenance record that puts creators first.
For writers, photographers, musicians, and artists who need proof that their work was theirs, first.
Family photo albums are full of stories no one has told yet. Project Story is a digital game that surfaces those stories, turning a box of old photographs into a conversation between generations.
For the adult children who want to capture their parents' memories before those memories are gone.
If what we're building sounds like something you want to be part of as a collaborator, a client, or a believer, we'd like to hear from you.
Get in Touch →
