An Artificial Intelligence Program Named Jarvis Has Been Appointed Curator of the 2022 Bucharest Biennial. No, Really

The opening of the 2020 Bucharest Biennial may be delayed, but
the next edition’s curator has no concerns. That’s because he or
she or it is a robot.

That’s right: the chief curator of the 2022 Bucharest
Biennial is Jarvis, an artificial intelligence program in
development from the Vienna-based studio Spinnwerk.

Named after the superhero Iron Man’s AI butler, Jarvis will “use
deep learning in order to learn by itself from databases from
universities, galleries, or art centers” and select works that fit
the chosen theme, Spinnwerk founder Razvan Ion told the
Art
Newspaper.

Jarvis’s curatorial choices, therefore, will be limited to
artists who are already on the art world’s radar.

Instead of a traditional in-person exhibition, the show will
take place in virtual reality, meaning that it will be accessible
to anyone in the world who has access to a VR headset. VR booths
will also be set up in Bucharest and Vienna.

The rise of the robot curator comes as something of a surprise
given that just three years ago, experts were forecasting that
jobs in the arts were safe
from AI invasion. (The website Replaced by Robot!? still
ranks curator as the 34th safest of 702 jobs, with only a .68
chance of automation.)

But since 2017, a robot artist named Ai-Da has generated $1
million in sales, and Christie’s sold an AI artwork at auction
for an astonishing $432,500—43 times its
estimate.

This year’s edition of the Bucharest Biennial, titled “Farewell
to Research,” will also be an online affair, at least for the time
being. Organized by Henk Slager, a curator of the human
variety, it was set to run May 28 to July 4.

Instead, two online events—a curatorial workshop and a symposium
titled “Contemporary Art Biennials—Our Hegemonic Machines in States
of Emergency”—will take place from June 23 to 28. The official
opening has been postponed until spring 2021.

The 10th Bucharest Biennale will be on view May 19–July 17,
2022. 

The post An Artificial Intelligence Program Named Jarvis Has
Been Appointed Curator of the 2022 Bucharest Biennial. No,
Really appeared first on artnet News.