Will Robots Bring The Demise Of European Artistry?

[franco + 96]

There are still some things robots can’t do, and one organization wants it to stay that way. Venice has been turned into the site of a 4,000 square-meter exhibition that highlights human craftsmanship this month, inviting artisans from around Europe to demonstrate their skills, from art restoration and watchmaking to glass-blowing and fine porcelain. The event, dubbed Homo Faber, was organized by the Michelangelo Foundation, formed by Richemont Chairman Johann Rupert and former Cartier executive Franco Cologni. Their goal is to promote the disappearing arts. Last year, Rupert said he envisions a future in which humans are displaced by robots in the workplace, and that technological advances are set to fuel demand for cultural experiences. More than 13,000 visitors have attended the exhibition to meet creators and observe their skills. They can also attend workshops to try their hand at the art of embroidery, or watch demonstrations in leather-making and weaving. The expo also showcases an array of objects including engraved crystals, bespoke eyewear and porcelain skulls. It also gives artists and designers across Europe an opportunity to network and gain visibility.
 

[Pavel + 384]

You should try with this headline: "Robots will bring Demise"...

[rainman + 263]

Don't fret. Buy robots instead....😂

[Petar + 76]

Robot art - I'm suspicious that could work....

[50 shades of black + 254]

When robots take over the world, maybe art will survive? 

[Marina Schwarz + 1,576]

No, they will not. Arts require imagination as do a lot of other human activities. AI is very, very far from acquiring imagination, if ever.

[Jan van Eck + 7,558]

Yet "robots," i.e. industrial machinery with programmable controllers run by microchips to set the machine production parameters, are rapidly expanding into all manner of traditional hand constructions.  Take for example the sock.  Socks were machine-made by automatic-thread machines, but they came out all in one color.  Add the programmable controller and now socks can be woven (spun?) with dizzying patterns in many colors, all pleasing to the eye - and cheap enough that you can wear the art on your feet!  

Now move below the feet to the rug.  Classic Persian Rugs were woven by hand, one thread at a time, to create fabulous patterns of rich colors.  The product would sell for thousand, and tens of thousands, of dollars -- each!  Yet a weaving loom driven by a programmable controller can manufacture such a rug for twenty bucks.  Sell it for five hundred and make a killing.  Does this put the Persian rug weavers out of business?  Of course it does.  Yes, there will be snobs that will only buy the hand-made product, just as there are the effete English that will only buy a Rolls Royce with hand-stitched leather car seats (never mind that the company is owned and managed by the Germans.  The horror!).   But those customers will be all dead soon enough, are already quite niche, and will not be replaced in generations to come.   Does that mean that hand-creation of masterful Persian rugs is going to be a lost art?   Not really.   Just as hand crafting of fine guitars, and of fine canoes, remains, so will fine rug-making.  But those rugs will be hung on the wall, as art, and never walked on.