Artistic intelligence

Poetic. Emotional. These words are certainly true of Mario Klingemann's work "Appropriate Response" (2020). It consists of a split-flap display, as is commonly found in stations and airports. But instead of information on departure times, viewers are presented with AI-generated messages, for which Klingemann trained the neural network GPT-2 with 60,000 quotes and aphorisms. To receive a personal message, you kneel on a bench – a religiously connoted gesture that can be associated with hope, but also with fear. What message might artificial intelligence have for me?

From January 14 to April 21, Gretta Louw's installation "Each Trailing a Dreamworld", in which the Australian artist explores the complex, many-faceted nature of the orchid, is being exhibited in the IPAI Living Room. A sound installation forms the heart of the work. For this, Louw trained an AI system with specially curated texts and numerous precise prompts. The process involved a back-and-forth between the artist and the AI until the final result was achieved. The result is a lyrical text – sometimes read out by the artist, sometimes by the AI – that draws the audience into the material and metaphorical world of the plant. "Working with AI is a lengthy dialog with the unknown," explains Louw. "You move between the constant disappointment with the inconsequential and the unexpected moments when something suddenly opens up – moments of joy that arise from the unpredictable, the hallucinatory."

Tanja Hirschfeld has also explored the interaction between artificial intelligence and her own artistic expression. The silk panels of her installation "SIMULAKRA LABOR" are based on Hirschfeld's own series of oil paintings, which she blended together using the AI software Midjourney. Time and again, the artist had to intervene to prevent the AI from deviating from her design language and aesthetics. Hand-embroidered questions on the fabric panels ("What makes you human?") reflect Hirschfeld's thoughts on the use of artificial intelligence in the creative process.

In their work "LABOR", artistic duo Liat Grayver and Daniel Berio emphasize that intelligence is not just intellectual but also physical. The title in this case refers not only to manual labor, but also to birth. In a one-week live performance, the artists created a mural from electron microscopic images of a placenta. The paintings were conceived and created by a generative AI system in collaboration with a robot – which, however, was dependent on human support. After all, a robot cannot (yet) mix colors, adjust brushes and position wooden panels as precisely as a human.

The works of Sougwen Chung are considered pioneering work at the interface of research and art in the field of human-machine collaboration. The first solo exhibition of these works in Germany was shown in 2025 at Kunstverein Heilbronn and IPAI SPACES. The sculptures and video installations presented were created in collaboration with a custom-made robotic system, which was trained by Sougwen Chung herself. The AI reacts to every movement and translates it into three-dimensional forms. This gives rise to a joint creative process between human and machine.