Disputing Biases – artistic tactics to hack AI-powered vision

What kind of artistic approaches to hacking machine vision exist? Are there art hacks that challenge AI-powered vision?

This lecture draws on presenters PhD research addressing conceptions of machine vision bias in digital art. It examines various artistic tactics to hack machine vision and trick AI. The lecture emphasizes the importance of understanding hacking as a multifaceted approach in resisting surveillant vision and discusses art's role in resisting and critiquing AI-powered vision.

Using visualizing as a research method 190 artworks from the Database of Machine Vision in Art, Games and Narratives are analyzed to discuss how art hack tactics have evolved from hacking CCTV cameras as sensorial devices to encompass approaches which challenge the design and deployment of AI powered surveillance technologies. As a form of hacking machine vision the lecture introduces the concept of disputing biases – an ongoing negotiation that provokes and carves space for discourse.

Ph: Violetta Wakolbinger