Exhibition
From February 07–11, 2019
Infinite Skulls
58 rue Chapon, 75003 Paris
Open from Thursday to Saturday, 1 to 7 p.m
+33 6 60 22 25 02
58 rue Chapon, 75003 Paris
Open from Thursday to Saturday, 1 to 7 p.m
+33 6 60 22 25 02
Exhibition
From February 07–11, 2019
450 paintings of “Skulls” which Ronan Barrot has painted over the last few years have been digitally scanned so that Robbie Barrat could train a neural network to create new images of «Skulls» from these 450 works. Once this neural network (a type of GAN) has learned to create new skulls, a near infinite amount can be produced. Robbie Barrat creates images that Ronan Barrot never saw but that his hand could have created.
Artificial intelligence is able today to create new images. The question arises of their status: Are they works of art in their own right? Are they possible inspirations for the artist? Are they the beginnings of a new artistic field? Is the algorithm capable of creativity?
This exhibition shows that, contrary to what was read in the media during the spectacular sale at Christie’s, the machine does not create alone. Not being gifted of consciousness, the machine can not think. But it opens up a new field of possibilities, introducing a reflection on the act of creation in itself and the status of the images it generates.
Do these images create a new creative space for Ronan Barrot or do they provoke in him an irrepressible desire to «rework» them for them to become his? Can the painter continue to create serenely against the production of infinite images of the machine?
This exhibition demystifies the role of artificial intelligence in the creative process by showing the place of man at all crucial moments of its development. Neither magical nor sacred, these images coming from the artificial intelligence are above all the fruit of a human intention.
Instigating a meeting between Ronan Barrot’s works, very thick in paint, and the production of images generated by Robbie Barrat, all in pixel, thanks to an artificial intelligence, seemed to us a possible way to approach these questions, without predicting the answers…
Ronan Barrot will soon be able to proclaim the paternity of 9 billion skulls created by Robbie Barrat!
Written by L'Avant Galerie, reviewed and corrected by Milan Deroubaix.
Etienne Gatti
How can we make a computer capable of creativity? How can we give it the capacity to imagine and create something new — as long as artificial intelligence, no matter how developed, is still based on our suppositions of how our own intelligence is built, and therefore condemned to the limits of our own imagination?
Fabrice Bertrand
For Ronan Barrot, because he is human and therefore connected to the world through millennia of memories and sensory apprenticeship, a skull is a meaningful object. Such obviousness is anthropological: a skull is an anatomic part of his and each of his kin’s bodies. It is what literally holds his mind together. Homo sapiens knew as much—in the bony carcasses of preys ...
Art et intelligence artificielle font bon ménage
AFP, October 12, 2019
Robbie Barrat et Constant Dullaart, explorateurs de l’art par algorithme
Arte Tracks, June 07, 2019
A never-ending stream of AI art goes up for auction
The Verge, March 20, 2019
Art & IA : Le début de premières oeuvres majeures
Paul Mouginot, February 22, 2019
« Infinite Skulls » : l'expo qui fait dialoguer art et intelligence artificielle
Usbek & Rica, February 08, 2019
Lecture
Over the past few years, several artists have used the assistance of neural networks (convolutional neural networks, generative adversarial networks) to process information sources to define new generic models. Faced with the normative models of deep learning applied for example to facial recognition, can artists develop new practices and establish a more creative position?
Forum Vertigo, Centre Pompidou, Paris,
February 28, 2020
Lecture
Artificial intelligence and creation is a subject that raises many questions. To discuss it, the Avant Galerie is organizing a conference by Robbie Barrat.
Led by Etienne Gatti.
Schoolab Vertigo, Paris,
February 05, 2019
Round table
Artificial intelligence and creation is a subject that raises many questions. To discuss it, the Avant Galerie is organizing a conference by Robbie Barrat, followed by a discussion between artists, but also a lawyer.
Led by Etienne Gatti.
Schoolab Vertigo, Paris,
February 05, 2019
Exhibition
Le Grenier à sel,
Avignon,
from October 09 to December 19, 2021
Round table
Centre Pompidou,
Paris,
February 28, 2020
Exhibition
The WPP Unconference,
Athènes,
from September 16–19, 2019
Exhibition
Ars Electronica,
Linz,
from September 05–09, 2019
Exhibition
Minnesota Street Project,
San Francisco,
from May 04–25, 2019
Exhibition
Galerie Zurcher,
New York,,
from May 01–05, 2019