HOW 展览｜策展人讲述「穿越本体——机器人艺术中国」展览倒计时5天

展览前言

策展人 张海涛

人工智能艺术从媒介技术上分为离身智能艺术（包括大模型艺术与生成艺术等）与具身智能艺术，具身智能艺术又分为：人形机器人艺术、非人形机器人艺术，具身智能本体是AI的环境感知与行动执行能力，是连接数字与物理世界的载体。人形机器人也有望成为“具身智能”的最终载体。“具身智能”最大的特质就是能够以主人公的视角去自主感知物理世界，而不是被动的等待数据投喂来实现智能化，机器人艺术也区别于当代艺术领域的动态装置，这是我推介机器人艺术展览的重要理由。

“本体”是事物最初的存在形式，具备实体性和相对独立的性质。“穿越本体”在这里有多重意义：即穿越机器人具身智能的本体与艺术的本体，也可指穿越“人”的本体与主体，超人本主义思潮也是未来艺术的趋势。艺术的本体多指艺术媒介、技术与语言这三个表达价值与观念的要素。人工具身智能领域里“本体”的概念，更加重视本体举一反三的“智能泛化”预设AI未来的境遇及观念。

此次展览“穿越本体：机器人艺术中国”由策展人张海涛策划，19位（组）中国艺术家25件作品参展，以中国的人形机器人艺术作为研究方向，表达方式也侧重直接性与实体性。展览强调不应该将机器人只是当作一种媒介技术表达的工具，而是在重视本体的基础上以拟人化的方式，表达作者生存的体悟和生命寓言性，以及表现人机终极的伦理关系，预判未来超人本生态而警示当下。

此次的作品大致可以分几个类型：一、机器人的意志与信仰的表达，即探讨人工智能奇点意识的产生会不会像人类一样拥有原罪，机器人未来如果拥有信仰，会给人类带来什么影响，如：高峰作品《造神计划》《智能原罪：贪婪与懒惰》、 翁嘉乐作品《失乐园》、01 小组（陈荣彬 梁链喜）作品《机体之殇》、邓碧文作品《创世AGENT》、徐戈作品《另一个无名的亚当》（机械版）、张浚琪作品《绝对真实幻觉》、林万山作品《耕魂乙》、迟世林《搓脸者》；

二、模拟人生，对于人类生理行为及生活方式模仿，触及人机边界的思考，未来社会试图构建一个超人本多维的生态，如：李杭作品《模仿游戏》、吕连涛作品《在能够直立行走之前》、俞科作品《家》、陈子健作品《算法河流不会回答三重舞》、SOSOSO Art+Tech（邱宇、陈鹏）作品《真言》；

三、未来机器人身份取代、信息化超能力的进化可能带来的社会危机感与文明退化的悖论关系，如：苏永健作品《进化机》 、牛艳寒作品《一个惶恐不安的时刻》、姚浩澜作品《MARS兄弟代驾系列 I 》、刘佳钰和黄恩琦作品《幻觉机器》、许毅博作品《凝视》、孟松林作品《黑色困境》等作品，总体上看所有作品都在触及人机社会结构的变革。

近几年AI似乎具有了独立意识，引起了全世界的恐慌。未来应该制定机器人法律制度、保护的机制。从社会价值上看人工智能将是未来重新分配人类知识结构、观念重构的核心动力。未来人类将希望实现终极的乌托邦的社会信仰，人工智能取代人类很多职业后，通过AI 运营获取的财富，供养人类，做到真正的平等幸福的生活。我们也希望通过我们的《穿越本体：机器人艺术中国》的展览试图为机器人奇点生态的建设做出自己的努力。

Exhibition Preface

Curator Zhang Haitao

Artificial intelligence art is divided by its media into disembodied intelligence art (including large model art and generative art, etc.) and embodied intelligence (EI) art.   EI art is also divided into: humanoid robotic art and non-humanoid robotic art. The essence of EI ontology is AI's ability to perceive the  environment and to take actions.  Thus it is the carrier that connects the digital and the physical worlds,  and hopefully to become the ultimate carrier of EI. The greatest quality of "robots as the ultimate carriers of EI" is that robots can perceive the physical world autonomously from the perspective of a protagonist, rather than passively waiting for data input to achieve intelligence. Indeed robotic art is also different from the dynamic installations in the field of contemporary art, which is an important reason for me to promote it.

"Ontology" is the initial form of existence of things, with the nature of physicality and relative independency. "Ontology Transit" carries multiple meanings here: it refers to transcending the ontology of robots as the embodied  intelligence, and the ontology of art. It can also mean transcending the human ontology and subjectivity, as the ideas of transhumanism also emerge as a direction of art in the future. The ontology of art often refers to the three core elements that express values and concepts: namely art media, technology, and language.  In the field of Embodied Intelligence , the concept of "ontology" places greater emphasis on the extrapolation of "intelligent generalization" of the ontology, presupposing AI's future  situation and concept.

The exhibition "Media Creation and Ontology Transit: Chinese Robot Art" includes 25 works by 19 Chinese artists and artist collectives, taking Chinese humanoid robotic art as its research subject, emphasizing on more direct and physical expressions. The exhibition highlights the idea that robots should not be regarded only as a tool for media technical expression, but rather, based on the importance of ontology (art ontology, robot entity), robots would express the creator's existential insight and personify his or her life allegory, as well as illustrate the ultimate ethical relationship between humans and robots. Eventually, robots would also predict the future of transhuman ecology and send warning to our current situation.

The works can be roughly divided into several types: Firstly, artworks that deal with the will and beliefs of robots, that is, to explore whether the generation of AI singularity would posses human consciousness such as original sin, or religious beliefs. These include works by Gao Feng's "God Creation Plan" and "The Original Sin of Intelligence: Greed and Laziness", Weng Jiale's "Paradise Lost", 01 team's (Chen Rongbin, Liang Lianxi) "The Tragedy of Robots", Deng Biwen's "Creation AGENT", Xu Ge's "Another Nameless Adam (mechanical version)" , Zhang Junqi's "Unless Reality is A Fake", Lin Wanshan's "Genghunyi", Chi Shilin's "The Penitent"; 

Secondly, artworks that engage robots as life simulation and imitation of human behaviors and lifestyles, works such as: Li Hang's "Imitation Game", Lu Liantao's "Rhythm in the Ground", Yu Ke's "Whole Family", Chen Zijian's "The Algorithmic River Leaves the Triple Dance Unanswered", SOSOSO Art+Tech (Qiu Yu, Chen Peng) "Truth"; 

Thirdly,  artworks that illustrate the paradoxical relationship between super-robots that aim at replacing humans, and social crisis and civilization degeneration which they may create in the future. Such as Su Yongjian's "Evolution Machine", Niu Yanhan's "A Moment of Trepidation", Yao Haolan's "Two brothers named mars, they were proxy drivers I", Liu Jiayu and Huang Enqi's "Robot lllusion", Xu Yibo's "Gaze", Meng Songlin's "Black Dilemma" and other works. On the whole, all the works touch on the transformation of the social structure of robot and machine.

In recent years, much discussions about AI that likely to have acquired self consciousness, have caused panic around the world. In the future, a legal system and protection mechanism for robots should be formulated. From the perspective of social value, AI will be the core power for the redistribution of human knowledge and reconstruction of ideas in the future.  Although AI will  replace many human occupations, we also benefit from the wealth  that AI bring us and help us to build a truly equal and happy life. Through this exhibition, we also hope to make our contribution to the building of the singularity of robot ecology.