A theory of images and visual culture, today, needs a theory of latent spaces. In a historical phase in which images are more and more generated, modified, circulated, seen and described by or with the help of different kinds of AI models, we need to understand the crucial role played by an abstract, mathematical construct whose cultural and political implications could hardly be overestimated. The talk will present some ideas on how to tackle latent spaces, their genealogy and their agency, and will also show how they play a central role in the contemporary artistic practices that engage with AI: whether to critically respond to its increasing presence in every aspect of culture, society, politics and economics, or to use it as a series of new tools for artistic production.
Antonio Somaini is Professor of film, Media and Visual Culture Theory at the Université Sorbonne Nouvelle in Paris, and a Senior Member of the IUF (Institut Universitaire de France) with a 5-year project on the impact of AI on images, visual culture and practices in the field of photography, film and contemporary art. Currently visiting professor at Harvard, he is the chief curator of the exhibition The World Through AI that will be presented at the Jeu de Paume museum in Paris between April and September 2025. Among his latest publications on AI and visual culture, his participation in the “Questionnaire on Art and Machine Learning”, October 189 (Summer 2024), and the article “Algorithmic Images. Artificial Intelligence and Visual Culture”, Grey Room, 93 (Fall 2023).