Robot Artist Ai-Da Showcases Her Work in Oxford

If you ever thought machines cannot possibly be artists, perhaps Ai-Da might change your mind. 

Ai-Da, named after mathematician and computer pioneer (who is also widely regarded as being the first female computer programmer in the world) Ada Lovelace, was designed by Engineered Arts, the same robotics company that created the Westworld robots. 

Ai-Da looks as human as she can, at least from the neck upwards – below the neck, her mechanical torso and limbs are fully exposed, though she is sometimes seen wearing long dresses. 

Her facial features are not based on just one specific person though: instead, her creators blended in numerous features to give Ai-Da a face of her own. All that mattered was that she had a human form. 

Her eyes feature cameras that allow her to identify what’s in front of her and transfer that information from her eyes, to her hand and from her hand to paper.

Ai-Da relies on AI algorithms developed by the Oxford University to produce an art style that is unique. Some of her art also features collaborations with humans who have guided her impressions of the world via the same algorithms. 

Aidan Meller is the director of an art gallery in Oxford, England and a strong believer that AI is the key to our future. So he decided that Ai-Da deserves her own shot at showing her artwork to the world. 

That was how Ai-Da ended up presenting her very own solo exhibition titled Unsecured Futures, in Oxford.

The exhibition will feature her drawings, paintings, sculptures as well as video art promises to make us all question “our relationship with technology and the natural world by presenting how AI can be a both progressive and disruptive force within our society” as well as explore “the boundaries between AI, technology, and organic life.”

So, if you happen to be in the United Kingdom, you have from June 12th until July 6th to visit the exhibition which will be hosted at the Barn Gallery at St John’s College, Oxford University.