The David’s World project team about the process of creation, David’s figure, AI and Digital Art

The David’s World project team, people with completely different backgrounds, who first met within the framework of the American Arts Incubator: Darya Levchenko, Olia Fedorova, Pavel Blinokhvatov, Yarema Ostrovsky, Alex Sirous and Yurii Tymoshenko told V.Art about the creation of the project, David’s figure, perspectives and difficulties of working with AI and attitude to digital art.

1) Tell us more about the The David’s World project. What inspired you on the subject of conspiracy theories?

At the beginning of work at the American Art Incubator, each participant suggested some ideas, from which the main and most promising ones were selected, and then teams were formed around them. Our initial theme was political propaganda, but in the process of discussion we decided to focus on fake news, so we turned to conspiracy theories. Just during this period, a lot of wild news appeared related to COVID-19 — about fallen 5G towers, about the Bill Gates vaccine, which was supposedly created for the total chipization of the population, that the virus is actually a bacteriological weapon of the United States, and etc. At the same time, many publications were published on how dangerous such misconceptions and their dissemination are. We thought it would be interesting to react somehow.

“The World of David” is a world, where a person is brought by distrusting the authorities and science, as well as by the ability of the mind to look for patterns in randomness, in fact it is a bubble where no information from the outside can get into, except for one that is in line with the opinion of its inhabitant. There are very special laws of logic, rules and understanding of truth in this world. We wanted to look into such a world in our project and show how this world becomes more insane and chaotic with the spread, reproduction and transformation of conspiracy theories.

“David” is a character, bot, inhabitant and owner of this world, whom we named in honor of David Icke, English writer and “professional conspiracy theorist”, who was banned on Youtube and Facebook for his videos about coronavirus. The user enters his world through a browser application and can ask David any question, but the answer will be only another speech about who “really” controls the world, about the “real truth” about coronavirus and that “everyone hides”. Because David, as a typical representative of the adepts of conspiracy theology, often hears no one but himself. With each David’s answer the virtual space around is transformed in a random, unpredictable way, and if the user talks with him long enough, then in the end he will find himself surrounded by a complete chaos and madness, from which it is very difficult to get out.

2) What difficulties did you encounter at the stage of creating the project and while working with a cross-functional team?

Darya: Different members of our team had different visions depending on their field of expertise. It was a very unusual experience for me.

Yarema: We had no problems with this in particular. But the problem could be with setting priorities. That is, we worked so that we can do what we can, ideally, there should have been a larger design preparation, but on this scale we did well.

Alex: One of the main difficulties was time. But in general teamwork went well. It was, of course, difficult at the beginning, since we were all almost unfamiliar, but by the end everything was super, everyone had cool skills that we could combine and apply in the project!

Pavel: Unfortunately, there were no difficulties.

Yurii: Different time frames when it is convenient to work. And team responsibility, where the success of others depends on the results of some team members.

Olia: It is really difficult to coordinate in time while working as a remote team, plus we did not know each other before we got united, and it took time to work well together. Moreover, all members are from different areas, with different views and experience, but on the other hand, it is good to learn to hear someone else’s position and clearly state their own.

3) Have you worked in the field of digital art before? What are its advantages / disadvantages compared to the traditional art?

Darya: I have studied digital arts before, and I’ve made cross-media visualizations for my research but I’ve never created the objects of art before participating in AAI. To me, digital art projects are more similar to cinema and literature since they are multidimensional and could grow and develop on their own.

Yarema: Here the answer is very ambiguous, it depends on what to consider art and how to understand digital. If in general, the advantages are comprehensiveness, speed, lack of limits, cheap production, an infinite number of copies and, perhaps most importantly, accessibility. The disadvantages are ephemerality, seen and forgotten, digital art has less value, no uniqueness, much smaller scale. Also lack of materiality, it is impossible to limit copies. As such collecting is impossible, there is no increase in value in the future, relevant only now, requires a technological component.

Alex: I worked for a long time with digital animation in 3D and 2D, and then switched to new technologies and modern media. It seems to me that the main advantage of new media is their novelty, unstudied and great flexibility, they still have a lot to learn and to be combined with. These technologies have appeared in our generation and thus reflect it very well.

Yurii: I have been writing electronic music for a long time, and participating in the project is the result of my consistent development in this direction.

Olia: I am an artist more inclined to conceptual art, mainly work with photography, video and installation. It seems to me that the advantages and disadvantages of this or that kind of art cannot be said so unequivocally. Both types of art require specific knowledge and equipment. But for me digital is more convenient in the way that it does not exist in the material, does not take up space in space and the cost of an error in it is not as high as, for instance, in graphics, where one careless stroke can put an end to all hours of work .

4) How do you see the future of the project? Is it planned to be publicly available?

Darya: The absurd world of conspiracy theories — that each of us has to face these days — is not going anywhere, so art projects like ours simply have to appear to counterbalance all the appeals to the government to take down 5G towers and all the thousands of reposts about vaccines that cause autism.

Yarema: Of course, there is no art without the public. Therefore, the only chance for this project to live is to open it to the world. I see this as a pilot version, we have to start with the design so as to develop it. Establish the comprehensiveness of information, stages of development, how to present it for the first time and what are the next stages of development.

Alex: It seems to me that our project has enormous prospects, it has a very relevant agenda, and it can qualitatively stand out from others in the field of contemporary art.

Pavel: The development of the project depends on the feedback of the target audience.

Yurii: Yes, but so far it is at the planning stage.

Olia: As a part of the American Arts Incubator, we did not present the final product due to tight deadlines and limited opportunities, but its concept, so as to say, the project proposal. Therefore, I would like to start to implement it, nevertheless, at least in the originally declared form with all the functionality that we have contemplated. And then, I think, even in this form it will look cool in the space of the gallery of modern art, both physical and virtual. Further, of course, I would like to develop the project both conceptually and technically, make it more complex and more interactive.

5) What are the prospects and difficulties of working with AI in your opinion?

Darya: A lot of the instruments for integrating machine learning and computer vision into art are open-access so there’s a ton of potential there. The difficulties are less evident since computer-assisted or fully generated arts often raise ethical concerns in the artistic community. Tech difficulties mostly come from the fact that any machine requires a lot of power to learn and generate real-time feedback and most laptops just aren’t there yet.

Yarema: I see more prospects than difficulties. I think that soon AI will have a big impact on our lives, and we will not be able to progress without it. All routine work, searches, sorting, selection will be done by AI. As for the difficulties, I think now these are technical capabilities, weak computers and slow calculations. This greatly slows down the development of AI.

Alex: Now the big difficulty associated with neural networks is their single-tasking and the inability to set goals for themselves. In contrast, there are prototypes of biocomputers that can work on a variety of tasks at the same time, but they do not have such successes as neurons. It seems to me that these technologies can influence each other in the future, as well as the introduction of quantum computers.

Yurii: The prospects are wide, and the difficulties are mainly with setting up and curating, teaching these algorithms, which result is good and which is not, and it takes time to select good results from not such good ones.

Olia: I think the main difficulty that scares away many artists is the need to have many skills, especially technical ones, for example, programming languages. Therefore, while working with AI and digital art in general, it is the creative teams who have the greatest prospect rather than individuals, each team member has his own specialization and contributes to the overall work. Technology is changing the world every day, and art, responding to reality, cannot do anything else but change, just as the artists themselves and the principles of their work.

6) What are our forecasts of the changes in the art world to come in connection with the pandemic and after the abolition of forced quarantine measures?

Darya: Many creatives will permanently go freelance and take up remote projects. Naturally, their reflections on isolation, loneliness, and the mediation of human relationships by the machines will flood the web galleries. All the raves and offline festivals will be postponed for quite a while, and travel will become domestic.

Yarema: Art is the first field to suffer during the economic crisis. But in such times art is reborn, receives energy, emotions from external events. So it will lead to something new. I think that this first pandemic in our time will change the perception of things forever, for example, the online world will occupy most of everyday life. And digital art will also play an important role.

Olia: There will be many projects on self-isolation, on distance, on quarantine and total surveillance; basically, it seems to me, banal and too head-on, because it is still needed to take more time for smart and “big” projects, and that we would have been able to begin to calmly reflect on what happened to us. The art market, of course, will increasingly master online, but it seems to me that the “live” experience of visiting galleries will still be in demand.