How can you be anybody in Zoomspace? Very recent developments in deep-learning, allow creating synthetic media of unprecedented quality and ease. The first-order-motion-model can do facial reenactment in real-time, provided with only a single image of your desired avatar. This came not a moment too soon, as Human communication was forced to move online due to the Coronavirus pandemic. Can this be an opportunity to fulfill the long promised cybernetic utopia, where we could shed our physical shells and become however we wish to be? And how does this pertain to issues of privacy, identity and trust?
I will review the contemporary technologies and show how I use them in my artistic and activist practices. This is a hands-on participatory tutorial, where you will create deep-fake videos using your own materials, and play with various options of becoming an online avatar, including what may be the first available purely online solution for live real-time avatars from the webcam. try it here: j.mp/cam2head . No prior knowledge needed.
Eyal Gruss
A poet, new-media artist and machine learning researcher. I am a Talpiyot graduate and hold a PhD physics. I am also a social activist. My artistic works explore and exploit the relationship between poetry, technology and society. My works include poetry (lyrical, constrained, performative, visual
and digital), interactive installations, digital performances and computer-generated art using machine learning (aka artificial intelligence). I give lectures and workshops on machine learning, creativity, and computer-generated art, both to professionals and to the general public. I am mostly
interested in generative methods and in computational creativity. Most recently I am focused on visual poetry and the synesthetic experiences made possible by generative algorithms. My works were exhibited in Bloomfield Science Museum in Jerusalem, Bat-Yam Museum, Herzelia Museum for contemporary arts, Meter-Al-Meter festival, Ars-Electronica festival, Print Screen festival, Fresh Paint festival, Karov theater, DLD in Tel-Aviv, SVA in New York, Heinz Nixdorf MuseumsForum, Midarom
Festival, Utopia Festival, and the internet, to name a few.
