NEURAL NET AESTHETICS

Neural Net Aesthetics is the third edition of a series of panels titled “Net Aesthetics” initiated by Rhizome, which explores the actuality and potentiality between art practice and advancing technology. Their first edition Net Aesthetics 2.0 (2006, accessible here: https://rhizome.org/events/net-aesthetics-20/) looked at art-making at the age of “Web 2.0” and the second edition Post-Net Aesthetics (2013) discussed topics like post-human and corporate aesthetics in “post-internet art” (accessible here: https://rhizome.org/events/post-net-aesthetics/). This year, with the boosting popularity on AI technology, Rhizome chooses to explore the current art practices interacting with generative AI and present the main projects of three cross-sectional artists: Refik Anadol, Maya Man, and Eileen Isagon Skyers. 

Among the line-up, Refik Anadol’s work is probably the most seminal one which bridges a more direct and close link to the “Neural” in the panel thesis. As is suggested from the working titles in his glaring portfolio such as “Machine Hallucination”, Refik constantly deals with the potentiality of ‘autonomic’ performance of generative AI, trying to push the question “Can machines dream?” to the beyond, that is, to use big data and algorithms to dream and speculate the machine’s mimicry and perception of human reality. Maya Man, on the other hand, sets off from a gender scope. By deploying algorithms to generate counter gender stereotype phrase-memes (FAKE IT TILL YOU MAKE IT) and models of dolls (Ugly Bitches), she engages in providing a reflective thinking on the dominant narratives around femininity, authenticity, and the performance of self online. 

With the presentation of artists’ projects, the most relevant question surrounding the topic of the panel would be – can the machine or AI be considered as a (quasi-)neural network already? In other words, is AI creative enough, or in Refik’s terms, can machines dream? All of the artists seem to hold a firm negative attitude, for now. Eileen believes that even though AI seems to have the power to usurp human creativity, but essentially it is learning from human. Maya considers herself a 100% creator instead of gardener in her art practice interacting with AI. Refik maintains that AI has not evolved to a state that can be considered to have creativity in itself, because what it creates is based on the algorithm’s description. However, I wonder, would the next panel give a totally different answer?

 Event archive: https://rhizome.org/events/neural-net-aesthetics/

…and some photos from the live stream: