Overview

Louise Alexander Gallery/AFP, in collaboration with Fellowship, is delighted to present a showcase at Paris Photo 2024. This exhibition delves into the transformative potential of AI in art, offering a visionary exploration of creativity and technology that challenges the conventions of artistic expression.

 

When approaching a new artistic medium like AI, it’s essential to consider the evolution of photography. Over its nearly 200-year history, photography has transformed from a mechanical process into an integral part of contemporary art, shaping how we perceive the world. This transformation mirrors the journey AI art is undergoing today. We have focused on key moments in AI art, from Harold Cohen’s early rule-based AI experiments to the first text-to-image model created by 19-year-old Elman Mansimov in 2015.

 

This year, the exhibition presents three critical bodies of work, deepening our exploration into what AI art is and what it can become. These works, from Trevor Paglen, Holly Herndon & Mat Dryhurst, highlight one of the most dynamic periods in generative AI art (2015-2024) and reveal the interplay between human creativity and machine learning.

Trevor Paglen’s Evolved Hallucinations is a simultaneous artistic and scientific investigation into GAN (Generative Adversarial Network) models. By organizing his work into corpuses, classes, and neurons, Paglen exposes the limitations and biases of AI image-making systems. His exploration of the AI "black box" invites viewers to reflect on the ways machine learning translates data into imagery, raising questions about the relationship between human perception and machine vision.

Holly Herndon & Mat Dryhurst’s Infinite Images, created in collaboration with DALLE-1, explores themes of labor, art, and utopian landscapes through early text-to-image technology. Developed during the pandemic, this series reflects their experimental process as they pushed the boundaries of what early AI tools could achieve. The resulting images are eclectic and raw, representing a pioneering moment in AI-generated art. As they describe, “We can’t emphasize enough how surreal the experience was... it felt like we were holding a secret.”

Herndon & Dryhurst’s xHairyMutantx continues their inquiry into AI’s role in cultural production. Presented at the 2024 Whitney Biennial, xHairyMutantx is an interactive text-to-image model that invites the public to engage with AI-driven image creation. This work underscores the collaborative potential between artists, machines, and audiences, demonstrating AI’s evolving role as not just a tool, but an active participant in shaping artistic expression.

Through these three seminal works, Fellowship continues its curatorial mission of examining how AI, much like photography, will transform the way we see the world. Our exhibition at Paris Photo 2024 invites viewers to explore the relationship between these two mediums and engage in the broader debate on AI’s impact on artistic creation.

 
 
Works
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Xhairymutantx Embedding Study Diptych 01 181 93 X 121 29 Cm
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Xhairymutantx Embedding Study Diptych 02 181 93 X 121 29 Cm
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 490 2021 2022 50 8 X 50 8 Cm
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 484 2021 2022 50 8 X 50 8 Cm
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 509 2021 2022 50 8 X 50 8 Cm
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 96 2021 2022 50 8 X 50 8 Cm
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 181 2021 2022 50 8 X 50 8 Cm
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 178 2021 2022 50 8 X 50 8 Cm
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 157 2021 2022 50 8 X 50 8 Cm
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 95 2021 2022 50 8 X 50 8 Cm
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 510 2021 2022 50 8 X 50 8 Cm
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 634
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 636
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 629
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 665
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 637
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 645
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 566
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 660
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 558
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 659
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 672
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 585
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  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 661
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 561
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 576
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 587
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  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 609
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 680
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 584
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 551
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 674
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 582
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 682
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 673
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 669
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 627
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 612
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 554
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 626
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 603
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 658
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 649
  • Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst Infinite Images 646
  • Trevor Paglen Trevor Paglen Evolved Hallucinations Monsters Of Capitalism Vampire 16
  • Trevor Paglen Renaissance Stills Rose
  • Trevor Paglen Freud Window
  • Trevor Paglen Omens Rainbow
  • Trevor Paglen Dante Purgatory Sexual Desire
  • Trevor Paglen 07 Facecap
  • Trevor Paglen 01 Eggo
  • Trevor Paglen 09 Ghostface
  • Trevor Paglen 64 Aqueous
  • Trevor Paglen 21 Redshine
  • Trevor Paglen 74 Magrittesorbs
  • Trevor Paglen Adversarially Evolved Hallucinations Humans A Man 121 9 Cm 152
Installation Views
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