Laznia Centre for Contemporary Art

Exhibition of French artist and scientist Patrick Tresset deals with the issues of human and artificial creativity, and our relationship with the new generation of machines. His works are robotic forms, which, thanks to the use of prepared for this purpose computer programs, are able to draw portraits. Tresset, after several years of artistic activity as a painter and illustrator, having lost capability of this kind of creative work in 2003, began the study of computer and robotic systems that would be able to take a similar form of activity, while retaining his distinctive artistic style. The result of these studies are presented within the exhibition. 3 Robots Named Paul draw portraits of exhibition’s visitors. Paul – IX is a robot drawing still life from observation. Peter is busy with drawing signs and erasing them afterwards. Its activity is stimulated by events taking place in the room, which can make him excited or bored or depressed. All three robotic systems create artifacts, as well as carry out performances. They are works of art and at the same time they create art. Their creative activity develops in the space between art, computer science, robotics and artificial intelligence.

Patrick Tresset is a French artist and scientist who investigates human artistic activity, computational creativity and our relation to machines, in particular our relations with robotic entities. In the context of his art practice, Patrick uses robotics to create autonomous robotics entities that are evocative representations of the artist, and in a certain manner a representation of himself. His robots are based on advanced technologies using research findings from robotics, computer vision, artificial intelligence and cognitive computing.

Patrick encountered and practiced computing, painting, drawing and sculpture from an early age in France. Following a degree in Business Computing, he migrated to London to become a painter. Between 1991 and 2003 his work was exhibited in solo and group shows in London and Paris. In 2003, Patrick lost his ability to paint and draw, he has since been working on computational and robotic systems that are able to simulate these artistic activities.

Patrick’s research led him to join Goldsmiths, University of London, to study for a Master of Sciences in Arts Computing and until 2013, he codirected the AIkon II project with Prof. Frederic Fol Leymarie. The AIkon II project investigated the observational sketching activity through computational modeling and robotics. Patrick also created the creative robotics course taught to postgraduatestudents at Goldsmiths as part of the MFA Computational Arts programme. Patrick was recently a Senior fellow at the Zukunftskolleg, University of Konstanz in Germany and is a currently a visiting research fellow at Goldsmiths University of London, United Kingdom. As a researcher he has published academic papers in the fields of artificial intelligence, computational aesthetics, computational creativity, social robotics, drawing research, digital arts and computer graphics.

Patrick's work has been internationally exhibited in solo and group shows, in association with major museums such as Victoria & Albert Museum, Science Museum, Tate Modern, the Pompidou Center, Museum of Israel and art fairs such as London Art Fair, Kinetica Art Fair and Istanbul biennial, Ars Electronica, Update_5.

Patrick's work has been featured in major media including The Times (UK), The Independent (UK), The Telegraph (UK), Le Monde (FR), New Scientist (UK), El Mundo (SP), L’Oeil (FR) , Tank

Magazine (UK).

HUMAN STUDIES

The robots I develop are influenced by research into human behaviour, more specifically how human beings depict other humans, how humans perceive artworks and how humans relate to robots. The artifacts produced by these computational systems can also be considered as studies of the human.

The investigative side of my work feeds on research into perception, cognition, psychology and related fields, with the main investigation being focused on understanding how people draw from life. To further this, I study the manner in which artists, influenced by their experience, transmute what they observe into movements which are then transformed into traces on a surface. This doctoral research, mainly conducted at Goldsmiths College, London, in the context of the AIkon II project in collaboration with Frederic Fol Leymarie, slowly feeds into the development of autonomous embodied systems that are capable of drawing from life. These systems, of which Paul is an example, draw the faces of the humans who sit in front of it.

The technological element of my practice aims to develop computational systems capable of autonomously producing artifacts that stand as artworks. To evaluate the system's production, I rely upon my own artistic judgement, and in the same manner as a scientist on the judgement of my peers who in this context are drawing practitioners, art critics and curators. The implementation of such systems relies in part on research into the observational drawing activity, on personal insights as a painter and on research from fields such as robotics, cognitive computing and computer vision.

As I exhibit robots or groups of robots, a nonnegligible aspect of my practice is concerned with the installation’s theatricality. Since first exhibiting a drawing robot in public, I have become fascinated with the audience's response and reaction to it. This has opened up a space for me to explore, a space in which it is possible to play with the audience's emotions, memories and sense of wonder.

The original aim driving my work was to create autonomous systems capable of producing images which have a similar emotional and aesthetic impact on a spectator as humanmade artworks. It is important here to stress that the aim is not to invent systems that are capable of drawing precisely like a human, but for the drawing to have a certain aesthetic effect on the observer. I embarked upon this particular quest following the loss of my passion for making art and in a certain manner, have attempted to create an artistic prosthetic to palliate this loss. The autonomous systems I develop aim to replace part of myself, or more precisely systems that can act in the manner that I ideally want to act; systems that can draw how I want to draw.

Honorary Patronage of the President of Poland Bronisław Komorowski

Project „Art+Science Meeting 2015” is financed by the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage

BIP

Municipal Institution of Culture