MAK FUTURE LAB invites to AI Symposium: UNCANNY VALUES
In the exhibition UNCANNY VALUES: Artificial Intelligence & You, the MAK explores one of the most important topics of coming decades, one that will have a significant impact on all aspects of our lives: artificial intelligence (AI). It confronts us with new questions: is AI democratic? Can AI be a wiser and more just ruler than today’s politicians? Can it ever understand what it’s like to live together as social beings? What ethical obligations do programmers have, and what about the ethics of intelligent systems? Who is more intelligent, and who has a greater sense of responsibility?
PROGRAM
6 p.m.Welcome address by Christoph Thun-Hohenstein, General Director of the MAK and Head of the VIENNA BIENNALE
Introduction to the concept behind UNCANNY VALUES: Artificial Intelligence & You by the exhibition’s curators Marlies Wirth and Paul Feigelfeld
6:30 p.m.
Video screening and presentation, Process Studio (Martin Grödl, Moritz Resl)
7 p.m.
Keynotes by artists Tega Brain and Jonas Lund
8 p.m.
Podium discussion with artists Tega Brain and Jonas Lund, and curators Marlies Wirth and Paul Feigelfeld
PRACTICAL INFORMATION
Language: EnglishMAK Lecture Hall
Admission € 5 | The ticket also grants access to all exhibitions of the MAK on that evening.
THE EVENT
In the AI Symposium UNCANNY VALUES, we will discuss the potential of artificial intelligence and digital tools for shaping our world and creating new design processes, as well as for tackling urgent ecological problems and creating opportunities for direct responsibility and governance. Two internationally active artists, whose works are currently being shown in the VIENNA BIENNALE exhibition UNCANNY VALUES: Artificial Intelligence & You, present their work methods and research interests in keynotes.Martin Grödl and Moritz Resl of the Vienna studio Process provide an insight into the design process and present the advantages of working with generative design and AI-based models. At the heart of the UNCANNY VALUES exhibition’s communication design are AI-generated emojis called AImojis. Using input from a databank of several thousand frequently used emojis and with the aid of a Deep Convolutional Generative Adversarial Network (DCGAN), Grödl and Resl trained a neural network to create its own completely new variations of these tiny digital faces. A new video work on the birth of these AImojis celebrated its premiere as an artistic intervention at the official opening of the European Forum Alpbach 2019 and will be shown for the first time in Vienna at the AI Symposium.
Together with Julian Oliver und Bengt Sjölén, the artist and environmental engineer Tega Brain created Asunder, a work especially commissioned for the exhibition. The group constructed a highly specialized supercomputer incorporating specially developed neural networks that—permanently and in real time—analyze satellite, climate, geology, biodiversity, topography, population, and social media data. In her keynote, Tega Brain talks about the background research to Asunder as well as her Deep Swamp project, and her research findings in her essay The Environment is Not a System.
Jonas Lund, whose Significant Other evaluates the emotional parameters of MAK visitors at the VIENNA BIENNALE, talks about recent works on artificial intelligence, optimization strategies, and decision models. For instance, his recently developed “Jonas Lund Token” offers 100 000 shares that give shareholders the right to influence future decisions regarding his artistic praxis.
Following the keynotes, the two artists discuss with the exhibition’s curators the implications of artificial intelligence for culture, society, and ecology.
Process Studio (Martin Grödl, Moritz Resl) is an experimental design studio based in Vienna that focuses on generative and interactive design and works in the areas of branding, web, installation, and print. In addition to classical design solutions, Process designs and develops specific software, which is used as an independent tool, and develops conceptual generative design using the latest technologies such as artificial intelligence or GANs (Generative Adversarial Networks).
Tega Brain is an Australian born artist and environmental engineer whose eccentric engineering intersects art, ecology & engineering. Her work takes the form of dysfunctional devices, eccentric infrastructures and experimental information systems. She has recently exhibited at the Guangzhou Triennial, the Haus der Kulturen der Welt in Berlin, the New Museum, NYC and the Science Gallery in Dublin. Tega is an Assistant Professor of Digital Media, New York University. She has been a fellow at Data & Society and the Processing Foundation. She lives and works in New York and Sydney.
Jonas Lund is a Swedish conceptual artist who creates paintings, sculpture, photography, websites and performances that critically reflect on contemporary networked systems and power structures. Through his works, Lund investigates the issues generated by the increasing digitalization of contemporary society like authorship, participation and authority. Lund earned an MA at Piet Zwart Institute, Rotterdam (2013) and a BFA at Gerrit Rietveld Academy, Amsterdam (2009). His work has been exhibited, i.a. at The Photographers’ Gallery, Whitechapel Art Gallery, London, New Museum, New York, Schinkel Pavillon, Berlin, ZKM, Karlsruhe, Witte De With, Rotterdam, and the Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam.
The MAK FUTUE LAB is financially supported by the EU program Interreg V-A Slovakia–Austria (Project “Design & Innovation”).
