Machine Representation

Machine Representation is a video installation which shows an AI program learning how to make a photographic portrait of a real person. Training from a database of approximately 650 photos of a single person, the AI program is tasked with drawing a picture of that person. The installation shows the progress of the training.

How accurate is this machine representation of a person? And by extension, how accurate is any machine representation of a person? The internet has many different “portraits” of us, whether it is our driver’s license photo, our online shopping preferences, or a list of websites we visit. All of these are used as a proxy for ourselves, but are we the result of all of the data compiled about us?

Machine Representation shows the training of six different portraits, based on six real people. The video installation reveals this training process to be both inexact and indecisive. For audiences, Machine Representation is meant to illuminate the inner workings of the AI algorithm that is now affecting all of our lives.

Program length: 14:48 min