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Painting collaboratively with robots guided by artificial intelligence,
Sougwen Chung creates human-machine art. In her live performances with
A.I. systems, she seeks to change what she calls a "hyper-masculine" and
power-driven dynamic with technology.
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| “Picasso used the tools of his day,” Sougwen Chung says. “I’m interested in using the technologies that define our current moment, as a way of understanding how they work in our lives." Photo: Celeste Sloman for The Washington Post |
“I need to debug the unit,” says the 35-year-old artist. “It won’t cooperate with me today.” She strokes the silver-and-white contraption as if she’s soothing a child. Clearly, it is more to her than a “unit.” It’s a robotic arm that paints, powered by artificial intelligence.
Meet Doug. Full name: Drawing Operations Unit, Generation Four. Chung uses it and other robots in her performance-based artworks. She and the robots paint together on large canvasses, part team effort, part improvised dance.
In pre-coronavirus days, Chung led these AI-assisted painting performances in front of a live audience, on a stage or in a gallery setting...
It was during a research fellowship at MIT Media Lab that Chung discovered robotics. Here was a way to bridge science and art, and build on her sketching.
“I was interested in the physical embodiment, and what it would feel like to evolve my own drawing practice,” she says, “and I hadn’t seen robots used collaboratively at that time. I wanted to try something less about robots executing an existing code and more about working together.”...
Maya Indira Ganesh, a technology researcher at Leuphana University in Luneburg, Germany, says Chung’s work stands out because she rejects prevailing notions of robots and AI, and she’s comfortable with her own fallibility...
“Picasso used the tools of his day,” she says. “I’m interested in using the technologies that define our current moment, as a way of understanding how they work in our lives. The modern human is surrounded by smart technology and phones and machines, and I want to use them as a source of inspiration, looking to what future art practices could be.”
Source: Washington Post
