The lab-grown brain of a late music composer creates music after his death
In recent years, the boundaries between life, technology, and creativity have been blurred due to advancements in Artificial Intelligence. What was limited to just doing predictable tasks, now writes poetry, composes music, and does human conversation with uncanny precision.
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As machines learn to 'think,' humanity finds itself grappling with some questions worth a deep thought, where does creativity truly originate? Can machines imagine like humans do or are they simply copying what they've been fed?
AI has been used to revive voices from the past, by using the digital simulations of deceased artists, actors, and musicians, and these trials have raised ethical side effects about identity and the permanence of creative legacy, along with a major impact it can have on mental health.
But what happens when it's not AI, but science that projects an artist beyond death?
Can an artist's creative spirit continue to exist after death? This is a philosophical and scientific question at the heart of Revivification, a bold yet hauntingly beautiful project that fuses art, neuroscience, and bioengineering. Created by Australian artists Guy Ben-Ary, Nathan Thompson, and Matt Gingold, along with neuroscientist Stuart Hodgetts of the University of Western Australia (UWA), The project Revivification invites people to witness a
mini-brain composing music
in real time.
What does this project involve?
The project centers around an incubator housing a lab-grown 'in-vitro brain,' or cerebral organoid. This organoid was created using blood donated by legendary composer
Alvin Lucier
shortly before his death in 2021.
According to the team, 'Revivification was created with his full knowledge and consent; his donation of biological material was a conscious choice to participate in this posthumous collaboration.'
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The signals from Lucier's mini-brain are transmitted through 20 curved brass plates surrounding the space, producing sound via transducers and actuators.
The installation does not aim to replicate Lucier's past compositions but to explore the lingering potential of his biological creativity. 'What we've created isn't preservation or simulation,' the team told The Art Newspaper, 'but a form of 'postmortem play' where Lucier's biological material creates in unpredictable ways.'
The project was made possible through the now-closed SymbioticA lab at UWA and Harvard Medical School, where Lucier's blood was reprogrammed into stem cells and developed into the brain-like organoid.
The team said the work was developed in close partnership with Lucier himself. 'Despite his frailty at 89, his revolutionary spirit remained powerful. We established a relationship that went beyond the professional realm, exploring potential artistic projects together,' they explained.
'At a time when generative AI is calling into question human agency, this project explores the challenges of locating creativity and artistic originality,' the team said. 'Perhaps its value cannot be judged by scientific protocols, yet it remains something that we as humans should place great value in.'
They continued, 'Revivification is an attempt to shine light on the sometimes dark possibilities of extending a person's presence beyond the seemed finality of death.'
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