What if Artificial Intelligence Assisted You in Your Next Art Project?
Refik Anadol is a media artist who uses data as a pigment and paints with a thinking brush assisted by artificial intelligence. Architectural spaces are used as a canvas for his art and have been the main source of his inspiration.
As an 8-year-old Refik Anadol’s Mother brought home a videocassette of the science fiction movie “Blade Runner.” The architectural vision of the futuristic city of Los Angeles, Calif., portrayed in the movie mesmerized young Refik Anadol.
In 2012, now mature Refik Anadol arrived in Los Angeles for a graduate program in design media arts, he rented a car to see downtown.
“I remember a specific line that kept playing over and over in my head,” said Refik Anadol, “when Deckard tells her they are someone else’s memories.”
Since this moment he has been answering the question, what can a machine do with someone else’s memories? If machines can process memories and learn, can they also dream, hallucinate?
Refik Anadol established his studio in 2014, he invited architects, computer and data scientists, neuroscientists, musicians and story tellers to collaborate in his art.
“Can data become a pigment?” said Refik Anadol starting his journey colliding virtual and physical worlds.
San Francisco commisioned one of the first projects; Virtual Depictions, a public data sculpture piece.
The piece depicts the fluid networks of connections in the city. It is invisible data represented in art form as sensory knowledge which can be experienced by the collective.
Later, Melting Memories was created to visualize the moment of remembering. Refik Anadol found out his uncle had Alzheimer’s and wanted to create something “to celebrate how and what we remember when we are still able to do so.”
In January 2021, OpenAI, an artificial intelligence research laboratory, introduced DALL-E, a system that could generate images from text. In April 2022, DALL-E 2 was available to 200 artists, researchers, and trusted users. Four months later in September, OpenAI removed the waitlist and anyone can sign up and start creating.
DALL-E 2 takes the technology further with higher resolution greater comprehension and new capabilities. Artificial intelligence text to image generators give the public a tool to create digital imagery. DALL-E has over 1.5 million active users who are creating more than 2 million images per day. AI image generators have raised concern that they will be used to create harmful content, spread disinformation and advance negative biases and stereotypes.
There are limits like prohibiting images of public figures but people say AI should be governed by ethical principles. OpenAI has applied techniques to address the concerns and continues to develop their program.
