Evolved Art is the convergence of computer graphics, evolution, and art. The Evolved Art app evolves turtles. A turtle is a program that uses a language similar to Logo to draw a 2-D image. Evolved Art allows you to evolve turtles using Genetic Programming. As you evolve your turtles, you will guide their evolution to produce drawings that you like. In theory, the turtles can evolve to draw any image, but in practice they will evolve drawings that you find aesthetically pleasing.
In the 1980's, I was working with Genetic Algorithms and later with Genetic Programming. I also happened to stumble upon a book about the Logo Programming Language. In 1991 I conceived of the idea to combine genetic programming with the Logo language to evolve drawings, but the idea had to wait. Then in 1993, I finally had the time to write some code. So I programmed the first implementation of Evolved Art on a Macintosh 512k. I dubbed the program 'BioLogo'. This simple program was only able to display 24 turtles on the screen and only in black and white, but the resulting images were fascinating. I believe that was the first time that evolution was used to create computer graphics. I quickly realized the potential for evolving artistic images. In 1996, I obtained a Windows computer, and rewrote BioLogo for the larger screen and full color. The result was greater than I imagined. Incredibly beautiful and artistic drawings that exceeded all of my expectations.
Since that time, I have developed a website to promote Evolved Art, and now this iPad app. The iPad has proven to be the ultimate platform for Evolved Art. The graphics are extraordinary, and when combined with the high-resolution Retina display, touch gestures, and the animations of iOS, the application is simply beautiful.