Meet Ai-Da: The AI Who Broke Records At Sotheby's New York Auction
In the ever-evolving landscape of technology, AI is a hot-button issue. Slowly bleeding into the crevices of every industry as it integrates itself into our everyday lives through constant, almost daily advancements. There is no indication of AI slowing down; quite the opposite infact, following the latest news from auction house Sotheby’s. In a record-breaking sale, the first art-work by Ai-Da, a humanoid-robot artist, has sold for 1.1M US dollars. Sheesh.
Named after Ada Lovelace, the first computer programmer of all-time, Ai-Da's chosen mediums range from drawing to performance art to sculpture, but how does she do it? Well, through the cameras in her eyes, AI algorithms, and her trusty robotic arm, of course.
Through muted tones and broken facial planes, Ai-Da depicts the origin story of AI founder, Alan Turing. Ai-Da’s artistic output echoes a feeling of struggle that Turing grappled with while he tried to maintain control over this abstract technology. Ai-Da’s work, however, also taps into emotionality intrinsic to the human condition by way of actual human input. By doing so, Ai-Da invites discourse about the relationships and dynamics of human and machine, and the blurring boundaries between the organic and inorganic.
Ai-Da’s existence challenges our conventional, and sometimes limiting, beliefs around the physical, moral, and emotional world. The record-breaking feat Ai-Da achieved at the Sotheby’s auction underpins the movement towards integrating artificial intelligence to move beyond the bounds of the human experience, and create beyond what we thought was previously possible.