(A)I Tell You, You Tell Me

The first Atrium is devoted to the work »AEIOU« (2024) by the Karlsruhe-based artist group robotlab. Two industrial robots write machine-generated texts on a long conveyor belt, which allows us to participate in the self-reflexive dialog between two technological entities. The robotlab group (Matthias Gommel, Martina Haitz, and Jan Zappe) has been associated with ZKM for more then ten years. Through their work they explore the multifaceted aspects of human–machine relationships. »AEIOU« (2024) engages with our strange realities that are currently being created by synergies between robots and artificial intelligence.

The second encounter between humans and machines is the multisensory installation »Electrify Me, Baby« (2024) by artist Anne Duk Hee Jordan, who lives in Berlin and is professor of digital media art at the Karlsruhe University of Arts and Design (HfG). In her works, Jordan utilizes nature and biological phenomena as metaphors to engage in a dialog with art, science, technology, society, and identity that is often ironic. She creates hybrid worlds that elude binary thinking and counter anthropocentrism with a more-than-human perspective. »Electrify Me, Baby« (2024) creates a unified cosmos that oscillates between natural and technical phenomena and describes the way of the world, of life from the beginning to the end. Humorously, the installation invites us to reflect on our own existence in a world where all human and nonhuman beings are inextricably linked. Against the efficiency of today’s technologies, the artist sets her concept of »artificial stupidity«, which allows scope for mistakes and unproductivity as a means to readjust our relationship to our planet.

Alongside the works by robotlab and Anne Duk Hee Jordan, we are presenting the AI-based intervention »Flatware, Hardware, Software, Wetware« (2024) by the Hertzlab (Yasha Jain, Bernd Lintermann, Tina Lorenz, and Dan Wilcox), ZKM’s own department of artistic research. This interactive work draws on the work done on smart signs for artworks from the ZKM’s intelligent.museum project.  The artworks, here called »flatware«, come from the ZKM Collection and are rarely shown to the public.  Through the usage of AI, we are constantly challenged to find new individual interpretations of classic »flatware«. In the process, the supposedly true description of the picture actually turns out to be tongue-in-cheek disinformation that invites us to make our own interpretation. The installation thus questions our subliminal trust in the written text and undermines the cultural institution's presumed sovereignty of interpretation over what we see.