Goggles is the image search feature in the Google mobile app, and by layering the app’s best attempts to match his photos, Bland has created an artistic view of the world as seen through Google’s eyes.

His first experiment with it, for example, was a picture he took of a tennis racket. Google sent back a series of pictures that, while similar in tone and shape, had nothing to do with tennis. There was a polar bear, a nuclear missile launch and stock photo of a box of pills, among other things. Instead of being disappointed, Bland was fascinated. He liked that Google was confused.

“The way humans beings understand images is often through their content,” says Bland, a photographer and videographer who lives in London. “We have an instant emotional or intellectual reaction, whereas Google couldn’t see any of that.”

That first experiment happened in 2012. Since then, Bland has been shooting and then building collages with the results (he now uses Google’s web-based image search because it allows him to upload higher-res photos from his DSLR). Layering the photos makes cool art, but it also allows him to further investigate what the app is keying in on. Sometimes color is all it seems to chase; other times it gravitates to a random object in the corner of the frame.

via Google Is Alive, It Has Eyes, and This Is What It Sees | Raw File | Wired.com.