Expanded Animation - Ars Electronica 2017 - Lev Manovich (US), Artificial Intelligence and Image Culture

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE AND IMAGE CULTURE

In the original vision of AI (1950s-), the goal was to teach computer to perform a range of cognitive tasks - playing chess, solving mathematical problems, understanding written and spoken language, recognizing content of images, etc. Today, AI (in the form of machine learning) has become a key instrument of modern economies employed to make them more efficient and secure: making decisions on consumer loans, filtering job applications, detecting fraud, and so on.

What has been less obvious is that AI now plays an equally important role in our cultural lives, increasingly automating the realm of the aesthetic. Consider for example image culture. Instagram Explore screen recommends images and videos which we are expected to like. Image apps automatically adjust captured photos according to the norms of "good photography." Other apps "beatify" selfies. Still other apps automatically edit your raw video to create short films in the range of styles. In sports and concerts broadcasts, multiple robotic cameras automatically track moving subjects.

Does this automation necessary leads to decrease in cultural diversity over time? Can we use AI methods and "big cultural data" to quantify and compare diversity and variability in image cultures? In my talk I will discuss selected recent projects from my Cultural Analytics Lab including analysis of 270,000 artworks from Deviantart art sharing network, 7.5 million Instagram images shared in NYC, and 270 million images shared on Twitter around the world over three years.

Festival Ars Electronica, 8. September 2017

Fachhochschule OÖ – Campus Hagenberg (AT), Ars Electronica (AT)
Das Symposium Expanded Animation feiert mit der fünften Ausgabe sein erstes kleines Jubiläum. Im Mittelpunkt der Diskussion stehen hybride Technologien und deren Auswirkungen auf die Animationsproduktion. Die Entwicklungen werden in mehreren Panels aus unterschiedlichen Perspektiven von AnimationsfilmemacherInnen, MedienkünstlerInnen, Game-DesignerInnen und WissenschaftlerInnen ausgelotet.
https://ars.electronica.art/ai/de/expanded-animation/
EA2017_06_LEV MANOVIC