Would You Buy Homeware From A Robot?
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8 months ago
Ai-Da has designed a homeware collection that is somewhere between dystopian and chic
Are AI-generated interiors the new design frontier? asks Tessa Dunthorne, as robo-artist Ai-Da launches homeware collection.
AI Generated Homeware: Robo-Artist Ai-Da Has Launched A Collection For Your Table
The artist, Ai-Da, is the world’s first robo-artist.
She entered the art scene in 2019 to a great deal of fanfare and press. No, this wasn’t the latest ingénue hailing from the Central St Martins graduating cohort, nor some unknown name suddenly met with critical success. Ai-Da is the product of a lab rather than a studio, the world’s first robo-artist who sees with cameras in her eyes and thinks thanks to an AI chip in her ‘brain’. She is multidisciplinary, creating paintings, sculptures and poetry – and now Ai-Da has branched into homeware (marking potentially the first AI generated homeware collection on the planet).
Her collection of household items – mostly comprising one-of-a-kind prototypes – were displayed at this year’s London Design Biennale, and are still available to purchase, price on application.
From cutlery to vases, Ai-Da has collated the perfect space-age tablescape. The pieces, which appear veiny and porous, are inspired by the likes of the Bauhaus movement, Leach Pottery in Cornwall, and Picasso’s Madoura works. While they attempt to be functional, all of the works contain fatal flaws which render them useless – jugs with holes in the sides, for instance.
The project raises ethical questions. Her work is not completely her own. Like most AI, she will draw from the thousands of human artists that have come before, which means concerns about plagiarism and accrediting work are valid. But most artists are inspired by those who preceded them, and many designers similarly take stock of industry trends – nothing, after all, is created in a vacuum. And this technology is only getting better and better. So who knows? Perhaps we will be purchasing pottery and pans from android artists in due time.
