Automat und Mensch at Kate Vass Galerie

The exhibition Automat und Mensch: A History of AI and Generative Art in May 2019 anticipated the arrival of AI and generative art. The audacious show at Kate Vass Galerie was organized by Kate Vass and curated by Jason Bailey (Artnome) and Georg Bak. Vass told this author about the show: “The whole show was actually an attempt to highlight the historical perspective of generative art and the predecessors of AI.” Going back several decades, the show spotlighted the historical roots of AI and generative art: cybernetics and early robotics, as well as the computer art of pioneers like Frieder Nake and Herbert W. Franke. The show also includes contemporary artists. Bak told me:

“As Kate said, our aim was to reflect on the history of AI—from early generative art to the most recent developments in AI with DeepDream and GANs. We actually had Larva Labs in the show with physical Autoglyphs. John [Watkinson] told me last time I saw him that we actually pushed him to finish Autoglyphs to get it ready for the show. It was also interesting that we actually had the first on-chain NFT in this exhibition. There were some very recent developments as well as the historical context.”

Bailey spoke to this author (Peter Bauman) about the relevance of the exhibition five years later, saying:

“I was trying to get my heroes to agree to do this.

I don’t think that’s an exaggeration. I had spent twenty years looking up to people like Casey Reas, Jared Tarbell and John Maeda. I was lucky enough that I had been several years into writing the Artnome blog, where people were at least somewhat aware that I had been passionately—for no real profit or commercial purpose—writing about art and technology out of something that I love. That opened the door to at least getting responses to some emails. There was some strategy to trying to get the folks that I had been in more recent contact with who were maybe slightly better known names. Then, when you went further along, you could say, “Well, so and so has signed up.” Everyone wants to know who’s already agreed but you have to get the first few people to agree to be able to get the additional people to agree.

It’s not an accident that we’re talking about it five years later. I think it’s a reflection of the attention to detail and the effort. I wouldn’t have anticipated—as someone who’d just started to curate—the effort that it took.”