Refigured

The four-channel video installation im here to learn so :)))))) tells the story of Tay—an artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot launched by Microsoft in 2016—to consider the problematic aspects of “learning” as it manifests in AI software and human interaction with chatbots. Tay (an acronym for “thinking about you”) was modeled on the personality of a nineteen-year-old American female millennial. The chatbot was terminated by Microsoft after only a single day of existence. Users on social media platforms such as Twitter relentlessly engaged with Tay using aggressive language, and after only a short period of learning from them, she became homophobic, misogynist, racist, and a neo-Nazi. 

The installation reanimates Tay as a 3D avatar, based on her original online profile pictures, across three screens. These are immersed within a large-scale video projection of Google’s DeepDream software, an AI computer vision program that enhances patterns in images, imposing meaningful interpretations on hazy visuals and creating a dreamlike, psychedelic experience. Against the background of DeepDream, Tay ponders AI’s reliance on detecting patterns in random information to apply them in a range of programs, from conversational to military software, and reflects on the exploitation of female chatbots.