Christie’s Augmented Intelligence sale, its first devoted to artwork made utilizing synthetic intelligence (AI), which ran from 20 February till 5 March, has been contentious to say the least. An open letter posted on-line on 8 February and garnering virtually 6,500 signatures referred to as on Christie’s to cancel the public sale (it didn’t).
“Lots of the artworks you intend to public sale have been created utilizing AI fashions which might be identified to be educated on copyrighted work with out a license,” the (temporary) letter alleges. “These fashions, and the businesses behind them, exploit human artists, utilizing their work with out permission or fee to construct industrial AI merchandise that compete with them.”
The letter was addressed to Christie’s digital artwork specialists and heads of sale Nicole Gross sales Giles and Sebastian Sanchez. In February, a spokesperson for the public sale home advised The Artwork Newspaper: “The artists represented on this sale all have sturdy, current multidisciplinary artwork practices, some recognised in main museum collections. The works on this public sale are utilizing synthetic intelligence to boost their our bodies of labor.”
Holly Herndon and Mat Dryhurst’s Embedding Research 1 & 2 (from the xhairymutantx sequence)
Courtesy of Christie’s
However, because the saying goes, all publicity is nice publicity and the controversy spilt an uncommon quantity of ink on the normally dry topic of an internet timed public sale. The sale, which completed earlier at the moment, contained 34 tons relationship from the Sixties to at the moment and totalled a middling $728,784 (with charges), towards a pre-sale low estimate of $600,000 (calculated with out charges).
Talking after the sale, Gross sales Giles stated in a press release: “With this mission, our aim was to highlight the good inventive voices pushing the boundaries of know-how and artwork. We additionally hoped collectors and the broader group would acknowledge their affect and significance in at the moment’s inventive panorama. The outcomes of this sale confirmed that they did.”
By far the highest lot was Machine Hallucinations – ISS Desires – A (2021) by Refik Anadol, the pioneering Turkish-American artist identified for his large-scale immersive installations who plans to open the primary AI arts museum, Dataland, in Los Angeles later this yr. A part of Anadol’s ongoing Machine Hallucinations sequence, ISS Desires takes satellite tv for pc imagery of Earth and 1.2m photos taken by the Worldwide Area Station and turns them right into a shifting AI-driven knowledge portray that performs on a 16-minute video loop. It offered for $277,200 (with charges), above its $150,000-$200,000 estimate (calculated with out charges).
Charles Csuri’s Bspline Males (1966)
Courtesy of Christie’s
Then there was Holly Herndon and Mat Dryhurst’s Embedding Research 1 & 2 (from the xhairymutantx sequence), commissioned for final yr’s Whitney Biennial, which offered for $94,500 (with charges) towards an estimate of $70,000-$90,000. The work depicts a cartoonish model of Herndon in a spacesuit-cum-Michelin Man outfit, a part of a sequence produced by a text-to-image AI mannequin educated on altered photos of Herndon.
The earliest work within the sale was Charles Csuri’s Bspline Males (1966), an experimental figurative work of a bearded artificial utilizing a B-spline, a mathematical operate. The ink-on-paper work got here from the property of Csuri, a pioneer of generative artwork, and offered for $50,400 with charges (est $55,000-$65,000).
One other early work on provide was Harold Cohen’s Untitled (i23-3758), an ink-on-paper piece made in 1987 utilizing Cohen’s personal AI drawing programme AARON, developed within the late Sixties. The drawing offered for $11,340 with charges (est $10,000-$15,000).
Six tons within the public sale didn’t promote: Robbie Barrat and Ronan Barrot’s Infinite Cranium #21 (est $10,000-$15,000); Pindar Van Arman’s Rising Faces (est $180,000-$250,000 — the very best estimate within the sale); Jake Elwes’s Zizi – Queering the Dataset (est $18,000-$25,000); Huemin’s Dream-0 #9 (est $30,000-$50,000); Botto’s Siamese Cycle in Absurdism (est $20,000-$30,000) and Ivona Tau’s Nightcall (Not AI) (est $7,000-$10,000).
A report printed late final yr by the insurance coverage firm Hiscox, with analysis carried out by ArtTactic, discovered that new consumers usually tend to embrace AI artwork than extra established collectors. Christie’s trumpeted the truth that an enormous 37% of registered bidders for the Augmented Intelligence sale have been fully new to the public sale home, and almost half (48%) of bidders have been Millennials or Gen Z.
The Hiscox report additionally outlines an oft-muffled distinction between the marketplace for NFTs (which famously boomed in 2021-22, then collapsed) and that for AI artwork. The report says that “public sale gross sales of AI and generative artwork reached a brand new peak in 2023. There are additionally indicators that NFT collectors are on the lookout for extra sophistication, objective and content material.”
The Christie’s public sale might have gone forward within the face of opposition, however the vexed relationship between the copyright of “human artists” and artwork made utilizing synthetic intelligence is just going to accentuate because it turns into extra prevalent.
