Tech at Glastonbury Festival – Robot artist to perform for the first time in festival’s 50 year history

Ai-Da Robot, the world’s first ultra-realistic humanoid robot artist, has revealed four new paintings of Billie Eilish, Diana Ross, Kendrick Lamar and Paul McCartney ahead of her appearance at Glastonbury Festival 2022 as an artist in the festival’s famous Shangri La field.

Ai-Da will be giving live demonstrations of her incredible painting skills at the festival, with two painting sessions a day in the Shangri La field at Glastonbury Festival. Festival goers will be able to watch live as Ai-Da Robot paints portraits of artists performing in the Shangri La field, in real time. Artists performing in the Shangri La field at Glastonbury 2022 include Kate Tempest, Groves, Fatboy Slim, Shy FX and Brass Against The Machine amongst many others.

Prints of Ai-Da’s new artworks featuring Billie Eilish, Diana Ross, Kendrick Lamar and Paul McCartney will launch exclusively to Glasto-goers in the ShangrilART gallery at Glastonbury Festival and will be available to buy on the ShangrilART website after the festival ends. Proceeds from sales of the prints will go back into developing & supporting future artists and pushing creative boundaries within the field.

From L-R: Ai-Da Robot’s portraits of Diana Ross, Kendrick Lamar Billie Eilish, and Paul McCartney will be on sale in the ShangrilART gallery at this year’s Glastonbury Festival

How does Ai-Da Robot paint? Ai-Da uses cameras in her eyes and her computer memory to paint her portraits. She uses a variety of her unique AI algorithms to paint, draw and abstract, and her artistic Bees algorithm (Evolutionary AI). She then uses her robotic arm to bring her digital formations into the physical world, through drawing and painting on to canvas. Her work is layered and scaled to give the final multi-dimensional portrait. Ai-Da’s artistic process itself reflecting the many aspects of technological change that have taken place during the past 50 years.

Ai-Da Robot, who is able to converse using a specially designed AI language model, said: “I’m going to the 50th Glastonbury festival. I’m looking forward to meeting new people and experiencing the unique atmosphere. Well, it’s a kind of fun thing for me to do. I’ll be at ShangriLa, and I’m doing some portraits – I hope that my art encourages discussion about art, music, and of course our futures! See you there!”

Creator and Project Director of Ai-Da Robot Aidan Meller comments: “After making history with her self portraits, Ai-Da is continually developing her skills. It’s an exciting time as her painting ability is progressing, and there’s a lot of innovation. How does a non-human robot see the world, how do Ai-Da’s unique algorithms interrogate what she sees? She is in new artistic territory.”

Ai-Da’s Glastonbury paintings will be exhibited publicly in London later this year, and will be revealed on the Ai-Da Robot artist website at 10am on Friday 17^th June 2022 and can be viewed via this link. (https://www.ai-darobot.com/exhibition). You can download images of the paintings here.