To Refik Anadol, data is a creative force.
“For as long as I can remember, I have imagined data as more than just information—I have seen it as a living, breathing material, a pigment with infinite possibilities,” the Turkish-American artist said on Monday during his acceptance speech at the TIME100 AI Impact Awards in Dubai.
Anadol was one of four leaders shaping the future of AI to be recognized at TIME’s fourth-annual Impact Awards ceremony in the city. California Institute of Technology professor Anima Anandkumar, musician Grimes, and Arvind Krishna, the CEO, chairman, and president of IBM, also accepted awards as a part of the night’s festivities, which featured a performance by Emirati soul singer Arqam Al Abri.
Anadol has spent over a decade showing the world that art can come from anywhere—even machines. As a media artist and the director and co-founder of Refik Anadol Studio, he has used AI to pioneer new forms of creativity, producing data paintings and data sculptures in tandem with the technology.
“Over the past decade, my journey with AI has been a relentless pursuit of collaboration between humans and machines, between memory and imagination, between technology and nature,” he said in his speech.
This year, Anadol and his team will open “Dataland,” the world’s first AI art museum, in Los Angeles—an achievement no doubt informed by years spent producing dozens of other works that have been shown across the world.
It’s all part of his plan to make art that challenges the limits of creativity. “Art, in my vision, has never been confined to a single culture, place, or audience,” Anadol said. “It belongs to everyone.”
The TIME100 AI Impact Awards Dubai was presented by the World Government Summit and the Museum of the Future.
