Ghost Writer

Ghost Writer is a writing machine that uses a trained neural network to produce an ongoing narrative written in the artist Svenja Kratz’s handwriting. The narrative is based on an original stream of consciousness text created by the artist that reflects on the prospect of separating the mind from the body and being resurrected as an artificial life entity or digital clone. The original narrative also includes a database of seminal essays written by prominent critical theorists, scientists and philosophers that engage with the mind/body problem and posthuman and transhuman perspectives. The AI engine re-combines and re-writes the original narrative to produce new texts. The machine listens to its environment, which prompts its musings on the nature of its existence. The work encourages viewers to consider what constitutes identity and the self, and how consciousness may be altered if transferred into a machine or alternative technological body.

This work is a collaboration between artist Dr Bill Hart and Svenja Kratz.

This work was part of:

Science Gallery London from 28th Feb – 12th May 2019

PROJECT DETAILS

COMPLETED: 2019
MATERIALS: Interactive custom AI writing machine with video avatar.
CLASSIFICATION: Mixed Media Sculpture