DCU's Andreas Rauh celebrates his AIAI project
Dr. Andreas Rauh of the School of Communications, DCU, invites you to his upcoming research project culminating in this exhibition about Gen-AI and members of indigenous communities from South America will be available for all to visit at the National Botanic Gardens for Science Week from 10th-17th November 2024.
Beginnings:
What dreams, aspirations, and wishes would you like to become real in 20 years? These were the original questions posed in early 2023 to sixteen members of indigenous communities from South America, and now you can see their imagined futures.
By early 2023 Generative Artificial Intelligence (Gen-AI) such as MidJourney were released for public use. With these models came the promise that anyone could create images based on text, so no more need to learn drawing, sketching, painting, photo techniques, or visual design - we could all think up images.
With this in mind we set out to investigate what kinds of images would members of indigenous communities create, how close (or not) the images created illustrated their visions, and what could be done to make these images more representative of their wishes and aspirations.
As we worked alongside creating the images we faced several challenges, from cultural clashes to technological hurdles, but found common ground in the potential for greater control of one’s dreams, wishes, and aspirations.
The exhibition is designed for those who have experience with Gen-AI generated images as well as those who know little to nothing about them. It consists of two parts:
- ‘Be Curious’, an introduction to Gen-AI images that challenges participants to identify images created by AI from photographs taken by humans. The activity is designed to foster conversations about what makes Gen-AI images different, how to spot them, and ultimately what are the implications of these images to our understanding of the world and ourselves in it. This part is designed as a stand-alone piece but for those with little knowledge about Gen-A works best with a guided discussion;
- The AIAI exhibition of a selection of images generated by members of indigenous communities with MidJourney. The images are selected from a dataset of hundreds of images (project started in May 2023 and remains on-going) being generated by the members of indigenous communities with MidJourney. They are designed to be printed in mid-large format (A2) and have been selected to fit the exhibition room in the National Botanic Gardens, namely the 300 degree view, open-space, lighting, and the backdrop to the gardens.
