Christie's AI art auction draws big-money bids — and thousands of protests signatures
Christie's, known for selling fine art, luxury goods, and antiques — opened “Augmented Intelligence” on Feb. 20. The sale of AI art has raked in hundreds of thousands of dollars in bids.
In Christie’s New York gallery, a robot is painting a 10-by-12-foot canvas. It adds more oil paint each time a $100 bid is placed on it. But its creative vision doesn’t come from the artist who programmed it.
It comes from a technique called outpainting, which employs artificial intelligence to generate elements that blend with existing content on a canvas. It’s just one method used by the 34 works in Christie’s latest venture: the first major auction that exclusively features art made using AI.
“We’ve seen throughout time that there’s a lot of artistry in working with mechanical means for creating artwork, " said artist and roboticist Alexander Reben, whose aforementioned painting is up for bidding. "And I think what really matters is your intention and what you do."
The auction house — known for selling fine art, luxury goods, and antiques — opened “Augmented Intelligence” on Feb. 20. The sale has raked in hundreds of thousands of dollars in bids.
But not everyone is pleased with those results.
Rating: 5