João Martinho Moura: How Computers Imagine Humans?

Title:

How Computers Imagine Humans?

Artist(s) and People Involved:

Medium:

Code, iMac, projectors, speakers

Size:

dimensions variable

Artist Statement:

In this media artwork, Artificial Intelligence (AI) is used against AI to discover How Computers Imagine Humans, using a selected computer visual noise (one computer) and an AI face detector system (another computer). Both systems are running in real-time against each other, using just built-in cameras to communicate. In recent years, face detection technologies have been widely used by artists to create digital art. Face detection provides new forms of interaction and allows digital artifacts to detect the presence of human beings, through video capture and facial detection, in real-time. In this work, an algorithm proposed by Paul Viola and Michael Jones, is explored to generate imagined faces from visual randomness. Unusual use of the facial detection algorithms intended to do the opposite of what it is supposed to achieve: instead of trying to locate and capture faces, it generates facial images ‘imagined’ by a computer through the exploration of hypothetical possibilities. This work focuses on a particular point: we humans have created methods and instructions so that computers can easily detect ourselves, and, in this case, this knowledge is used to generate abstract pictorial face results. More than what if offers in terms of visualization of what is behind algorithms, this work, as it is presented, with two machines interacting with each other without a wired or wireless connection, demonstrates the ‘knowledge’ we, humans, try to implement into machines to detect ourselves — awareness about these technologies and their effects (positive or negative) on our society. The result is a ghost-human face, made by mathematics and probabilities, appearing very slowly as the algorithms work over time.