artonomous is using its imagination and creativity
to elevate its portraiture from art to Fine Art

artonomous is a collection of more than two dozen Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) algorithms, all fighting for control of a paint brush. Some of these algorithms are procedural, others are feedback loops, and many are neural networks attempting to imitate how the human brain works.(More details can be found here.) While each algorithm has an important role in completing the artwork, the focus of this project is to improve the neural networks responsible for creativity and imagination.

To achieve this goal, artonomous, Kitty, and Pindar are working together on painting 256 portraits, some representational and some abstract. The dataset that they will be feeding artonomous will be discriminating fine art photography created specifically for this project. As AI requires large amounts of data to learn, they will be sharing thousands of photos with it, and paintings hundreds of paintings together.

To get into details, the creative process behind this interspecific collaboration is as follows.

It begins with a set of curated photographs either taken or directed by Kitty. The robot then studies them and paints a representational portrait using its A.I. library.

Every so often, the robot reflects on both the final image and each individual brushstroke in an analysis that it uses to improve its neural networks.

artonomous then uses the improved neural networks to imagine and paint an original abstract portrait. (See this write up for more details)

Kitty and Pindar then critique the finished painting looking for ways to improve its emotional impact. When they agree on an approach, Pindar implements it by making modifications to artonomous’ code, neural networks, and hardware.

Repeat…

The trio then repeat these steps in a creative feedback loop to paint another set of portraits. Each cycle will refine artonomous’ process bringing it closer to complete creative autonomy, and its work closer to Fine Art.