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Arts & Communication

ARTICLE
Computer vision in tactical artificial intelligence

art

Dejan Grba*
Digital Art Program, Interdisciplinary Graduate Center, University of the Arts, Belgrade, Serbia

Abstract

Artificial intelligence (AI) art comprises a spectrum of creative endeavors that
emerge from and respond to the development of AI, the expansion of AI-powered
economies, and their influence on culture and society. Within this repertoire, the
relationship between the cognitive value of human vision and the wide application
range of computer vision (CV) technologies opens a sizeable space for exploring the
problematic sociopolitical aspects of automated inference and decision-making in
modern AI. This paper examines art practices critically engaged with the notions
and protocols of CV. After identifying and contextualizing CV-related tactical AI art,
we discuss the features of exemplar artworks in four interrelated subject areas. Their
topical overlaps, common critical points, and shared pitfalls plot a wider landscape
of tactical AI art, allowing us to detect factors that affect its poetic cogency, social
responsibility, and political impact, some of which are rooted in the theoretical
premises of digital art activism. Along these lines, the paper outlines the routes for
addressing the challenges and advancing the field.

Keywords: Artificial intelligence; Biometric AI; Computational art; Computer vision;
*Corresponding author:
Dejan Grba Machine vision; Tactical AI art; Taxonomic imaging
(dejan.grba@digitalartprogram.info)
Citation: Grba D. Computer vision
in tactical artificial intelligence
art. Arts & Communication. 1. Introduction
2024;2(3):2282.
doi: 10.36922/ac.2282 Contemporary artificial intelligence (AI) art is a diverse set of experimental, exploratory,
Received: November 20, 2023 and mainstream practices that utilize, contextualize, and mediate the phenomenology of
AI, with a history dating back to the 1970s and earlier. Its topics, concepts, methodologies,
Accepted: May 17, 2024
and presentational formats capture and reflect various AI research and application
Published Online: August 13, 2024 trends. 1,2
Copyright:© 2024 Author(s). Marked by a significant concentration of wealth and power, AI’s rapid industrialization
This is an Open-Access article
distributed under the terms brings about wide-reaching economic and political changes that occasionally prove
3
of the Creative Commons controversial. Notably, modern machine learning (ML) technologies increase the extent
AttributionNoncommercial License, and intricacy of corporate or state strategies that combine digital datafication with statistical
permitting all non-commercial use,
distribution, and reproduction in any reductionism for profiteering or social engineering, often amplifying their undesirable
4,5
medium, provided the original work effects. In a critical discourse that traces and questions the constitution of social reality
is properly cited. through modern AI’s technical logic and business practices, artists play a significant role
Publisher’s Note: AccScience by deconstructing, assessing, appropriating, and repurposing AI technologies to uncover
Publishing remains neutral with or underline AI development’s existential and epistemic issues and the economic and
regard to jurisdictional claims in sociopolitical consequences of AI capitalism. They continue the heterogeneous flux of
published maps and institutional
th
affiliations. tactical media practices that have energized art and culture since the late 20 century with

Volume 2 Issue 3 (2024) 1 doi: 10.36922/ac.2282