How VR and machine learning may influence the artworks of our generation

Virtual reality and machine learning are redefining art, and providing a new canvas for expression of thoughts and ideas

February 12, 2018 04:53 pm | Updated 06:42 pm IST

 Modern tech is poised to help enhance art and make it more accessible

Modern tech is poised to help enhance art and make it more accessible

Artists and designers are no exception when it comes to taking the help of computer software and gadgets. Such is the power of technology that the way ideas are conceptualised and expressed has changed dramatically.

With the availability of high-end gadgets, there is a new generation of digital artists, who don’t rely on conventional modes of pencil and paper. Technology has not only changed the way artists draw, but it has also ensured that their works are preserved longer and disseminated to a much wider audience easily.

Augmented reality, virtual reality, artificial intelligence, machine learning: they have all made their way into art and design. High-tech gadgets are no longer the preserve of geeks and nerds, resulting in ‘democratisation of the power of creativity’. Anyone with a good smartphone can be a creative photographer, and anyone with a good 3D printer can manufacture an object with a design of his or her choice.

Artificial imagination

Some common applications for artists are: Paint, Photoshop, Apple Pencil, Corel Painter, Autodesk SketchBook, Artweaver, Rebelle.

There are apps like Google AutoDraw that aid people who like to draw but are not very good at it. All you have to do is, draw as best as you can; the software, using machine learning, will compare what you sketched, with what it has in its large database; pull out the one that matches what you have drawn, and replace your squiggly artwork with a more professional-looking one. Then there is Tilt Brush which allows you to paint in a 3D space with virtual reality.

Recently, Microsoft announced it was developing a ‘drawing bot’ that will sketch a drawing from words, which the company says, is more advanced than existing text-to-image applications. “Each image contains details that are absent from the text descriptions, indicating that this artificial intelligence contains an artificial imagination,” says a post on the Microsoft blog.

Amidst these progressive trends, one of the institutions that has embraced new technology is the Srishti Institute of Art, Design and Technology in Bengaluru. Geetha Narayanan, Founder-Director of the institution, says the relationship between art and technology is nothing new. Referring to the path-breaking innovation of the Lumiere movement in Paris in the mid-1800s, she says technology was used to put a moving image on the screen; it was done by the artist, not by the entertainment industry.

Srishti, in association with Adobe and Bangalore Metro Rail, is setting up a studio named ‘Envision AR-VR Lab’, at the Cubbon Park metro station in Bengaluru, which serves as a hub for artists, engineers, programmers, designers, musicians, directors, producers, hardware manufacturers and researchers to explore the intersection of art and technology.

“We envision this lab to be a lens to the public, to showcase the endless possibilities of science and technology, and how it can change the way we think, work and behave in our everyday lives,” says Sai Krishna Mulpuru, Faculty, Experimental Media and Arts Department at the institute.

“Unlike film and the traditional visual media, AR and VR have the flexibility to engage the audience to experience their own narratives in immersive environments. Envision Lab challenges the conventional approaches of design by bringing together science, technology, and new media to create multi-sensorial experiences in public spaces,” he adds.

3D Sound Lab

At the Srishti Institute, the artists are encouraged to explore scientific concepts and use technology. Pointing to an in-house assembled 3D printer, Yashas Shetty, Artist-in-Residence at Art Science BLR, Public Laboratory at the institute, says, “We built this from scratch. It took us six months to design, develop and assemble it. Since we built it from scratch, we can reconfigure the tool to suit our needs.”

Their latest innovation is a 3D Sound Lab, which Shetty reckons is the only one of its kind in India. There is a computer, an amplifier and as many as 30 speakers placed in different parts of the room. On moving the cursor over the screen, you hear the sound of a tumbler falling or rolling, from different speakers, giving one the effect of the sound travelling around the room.

Different sounds of the tumbler falling and rolling were recorded by an artist using a special eight-channel microphone. The sounds were fed into a computer, where an open-source software controls what sound should go into which of the 30 speakers. Shetty says it cost a couple of lakhs, which was donated by the Goethe-Institut. It took the team around two months to assemble the entire unit.

Does an artist need a basic knowledge of technology? “Yes,” asserts Shetty. “Because this is the new medium; this is the world you live with. It is like an accountant needing to know Excel. Or you needing to have an idea of how to use an app to book a cab to travel around.”

Mind vs machine

While technology has revolutionised art like it has many other fields, there are artists who think art and tech are immiscible. Traditionally, creativity has been perceived as an innately human process or function. High-end technological tools are considered ‘alien’, ‘corrupting’ the ingenuity of the human mind.

Traditionalists aren’t quite amused by the marriage of art and technology. Their doubts revolve around these aspects: When you use high-end technology, is your work a product of human imagination or a product of the imagination of the machine? Isn’t it odd for artists to dabble in science and technology, when they could work on creative thoughts and give expression to them?

Shetty clarifies: “Art is not a painting. It is not a sculpture. It is a way of living. It is a way of questioning things. Painting or sculpture is just an end product. Technology gives us the tool to question the existing norms, break frontiers.”

Referring to the art-tech combination as a ‘deep engagement with technology’, Shetty asserts that the way artists use gadgets is more important. “You must craft your own tools, so that you are a master of your tool, and not the other way round,” he says.

However, KA Soman, a member of the Kerala Lalithakala Akademi, is cautious when it comes to relying on gadgets.

He explains, “Technology has provided the advantage of speed and precision to the artist. But, there are several instances, where art has been sought to be manipulated in this way, which is never a welcome sign. Computer-assisted art is a separate class, distinct from the fine art which is original.”

What lies ahead

While traditional artists will continue to have a place of their own, how the bonding between art and technology will pan out is anybody’s guess.

Narayanan contends that art, design and technology are in a critical relationship. “Art has the imagination, design uses the insight, and technology is the enabler of complex but super-fast change,” she says.

In her view, there is a need for greater understanding of neuroscience in the application of creativity. “Because when you are competing with artificial intelligence, with automation, you need to know what is specifically human about us. You need to understand human consciousness, psychology, behaviour, and all other emotions, physiological dimensions, the impact of technology on the physiology of the brain. When an artist plays with automation or artificial intelligence or DNA, all of these allow for a completely new emergent future to arise,” she says.

Highlighting that real art must survive and establish its identity over and above virtual art, Soman suggests, “It’s better that technology gets more focused on commercial art, leaving more space for painters and artists to engage themselves with ‘real’ art, which is more within their creative domain than the other.”

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