Ai-Da, named after 19th-century mathematician Ada Lovelace, is the world’s first ultra-realistic robot artist — invented by UK art dealer Aiden Meller in collaboration with university specialists in 2019. Next month, Ai-Da will be the first of its kind to auction her paintings at Sotheby’s London, challenging the extent to which artificial intelligence mediates the human experience to date.
Over the past five years, Ai-Da has exhibited at renowned galleries like the V&As, the Venice Biennale, and Tate Modern. Additionally, speaking at TEDxOxford on ‘The Intersection of Art and AI,’ Ai-Da blurs the boundaries between AI and the human mind, redefining our perceptions of art, technology, and creativity. More impressively, Ai-Da’s influence extends globally; her various collaborations with artists and mural paintings of Queen Elizabeth II at her 70th Platinum Jubilee are shared with her 101K Instagram followers regularly.
How does Ai-Da create art?
“Cameras within Ai-Da’s eyes takes in images,” explains Meller in a short documentary interview with the BBC. “The images are then interrogated by algorithms, translated into real-time coordinates, and finally signaled to the arm and pen.” In this way, Ai-Da can create and execute creative decisions with independent agency.
Uniquely, Ai-Da’s creation process of generating art from stimulus around her differs the robot from other AI art tools. “Sadly, people are starting to think that something like Dalle or Midjourney is AI art,” says Meller, adding that such AI art generators are only “one bit of AI art, which can be used in lots of different ways.” And Ai-Da is certainly one of the most innovative approaches.
Amongst the many experts guiding Ai-Da’s generation of thoughtful artistic ideas is Ai-Da’s personal curator Lucy Seal, who converses with the robot before the creation of new paintings. While Ai-Da’s artworks span a variety of styles and mediums, many of her works are influenced by the cubist revolutions of the 20th century, spotlighting the transiency and unstable nature of the social construct. By prioritizing the expression of relevant issues faced in the 2020s, Ai-Da reflects the scurried pace of social change, channeling feelings of unfamiliarity and adaptation to provoke a sense of relevancy in audiences.
Does Ai-Da’s art creation process make her creative? “I am creative,” says Ai-Da, as my art is “new, original, and of cultural value.” As the trait of creativity has been historically synonymous with being uniquely human, such statements have sparked heated debates about the definition of creativity and artistry.
What does it mean to be an artist? Who and what can create art? What is creative?
Many of such questions concern industry experts and academics alike, complicating the potential of such algorithmic inventions in morphing artistry in dehumanized directions. In Springer’s journal of AI and Ethics 2024, author Eleonora Lima criticizes Ai-Da’s capabilities as “obscuring the dangers of AI” and potentially “miseducation audiences about the attribute of human-like qualities.”
In particular, Lima expresses concern about the increased anthropomorphism, or “posthuman embodiment,” of AI as a facade, calling out Ai-Da’s creators as “dazzling the audience” and “overstating the robot’s capabilities” instead of presenting transparent mechanisms. Lima further cements such informational discrepancy as having ramifications, potentially promoting the “dated conception of art as the product of the interiority of a lone genius” and engendering political, cognitive, ethical, and gender-based misconceptions brought about by Ai-Da’s appearance.
Regardless, Ai-Da’s creators seem to be aware of the potential dangers brought by the rise of AI technology, including the relationship between human and algorithmic biases. “This technology could be amazing – or it could be terrifying,” exclaims Meller in Ai-Da’s debut feature in the Tempus Magazine, “she’s a machine; there’s no human here, although she might move like one,” he adds.
While the question of whether Ai-Da is a real artist may be forever of debate, the creation of such an intricate machine by a group of ambitious researchers is by all standards “a work of art.”
Written by Julia Jiang
