“Chaotic objects” is a video installation that explores the ways in which we, as humans, situate ourselves in a hyper-consumerist world cluttered with objects. Well-designed objects cater to our needs so seamlessly that we often interact with them mechanically. But what happens when we are actively made to reconsider the elements of design? In “The Design of Everyday Things,” Don Norman speaks of “affordances”: the relationship between a physical object and a person that determines how the object could be used. This project makes use of machine learning to generate warped images of everyday objects. It invites the audience to consider the ways in which affordances shift according to the varying degrees of distortion of these objects. It also forces us to consider why these objects are designed exactly the way they are. Is their purpose purely functional? What happens when we take functionality out of the equation?