For the longest time, access to the works of legendary classical artists, such as Leonardo da Vinci, Pablo Picasso, and Vincent van Gogh, has been limited to the mass audience. Socioeconomic status was the main driving force for ordinary people not to see the works in different museums across the globe. At the same time, some pieces were kept in private collection archives. But thanks to technology, the gates are now slowly opening for every art enthusiast to glimpse the works of the masters.
In the Philippines, in partnership with Bonifacio Global City, Ouchh, an award-winning art studio from Istanbul, Turkey, brought “Wisdom of Da Vinci: An Immersive AI Experience” to the country. This impressive art exhibition does not simply show the works and wisdom of Da Vinci, but is a testament to the power of science, artificial intelligence (AI), classical artworks, and the brilliant minds of passionate creatives, when combined, to bring art closer to people, especially science and data nerds.
With the use of their proprietary machine learning program, which took Ouchh 14 years to perfect, the studio derives data from multiple sources, including data from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)'s Kepler space telescope that covers 500,000 stars, 2,500 planets, and 60 supernovae. They also used data from the human body and scientists like Albert Einstein and Galileo Galilei. All of this scientific data is transformed in real time, creating a breathtaking, immersive art experience for every visitor.
“Step one is the collection and the classification of the data. The second part is making expression process made by AI algorithm and python coding. It gave us different types of 2D artworks, sometime noise, there are too many outputs from the AI,” Ferdi Alici, director and founder of Ouchh tells Manila Bulletin Lifestyle in an interview when asked about the process behind the immersive art show. “The third part is the animation we use to draw output. Then the simulation means that we are making the artistic decisions like the light setup or the scene's complexity. Still, when we push the play button, it’s the AI making decision for the spectrum, behavior of the particles, and the complexity of the particles.”
"Wisdom of Da Vinci: An Immersive AI Experience" has different parts or stages. Visitors will start at the Curator Lounge, where the Poetic AI Gallery is. It is an exhibition that explores the relationship between human creativity and technology. It draws on a digital library of 20 million lines derived from the works of scientists paired with Ouchh’s signature aesthetics with cutting-edge AI algorithms.
“We feed the data archive, and we feed the AI. The AI started to make a new paint which is six billion brush strokes. We are trying to integrate art, science, and technology inside public space. There are more than 100 types of data set we used for making arts,” Ferdi says. “This is the perfect collaboration between the artist and the machine because as the artists, we are putting the rules in the software. Data is the paint and algorithm is the brush. It means we are not engineers or data scientists, we are artists.”
The next part of the Curator Lounge is the "Manila Real-time Data Artwork," a digital journey about the Philippine economy. This part of the exhibit utilizes data from budgets, agriculture, and statistics. The result is a data piece that fluctuates in real time, changing as it reflects the nation's pulse.
Then there's the immersive hall for the "Digital Garden of Dreams" show. This dynamic work features four parts of data painting: Atlas, inspired by Leonardo da Vinci's "Vitruvian Man" and his study of the human body to bring together the work of scientists the world over; DataGate, a collaboration with NASA using data gathered by the Kepler space telescope; Superstrings, a cognitive performance that features real-time brain waves of the members of the Manila Symphony Orchestra; and Filipino Master, depicting the works of Juan Luna created throughout his lifetime, translated as data paintings.
Lastly, the second immersive hall is where the show's star shines: "The Wisdom of Da Vinci." This show highlights his timeless works, including the Mona Lisa, down to the details of his manuscripts. This room breathes life into its own abstract aesthetic language, all created using data from sketches, invention plans, and paintings of Da Vinci. The visuals are accompanied by music curated and performed by world-famous Italian pianist and composer Ludovico Einaudi, who also composed music for award-winning movies such as "Nomadland" and "The Father."
With all the success and recognition Ouchh is getting from their works, equipped with technology, Ferdi firmly believes that technology is just a tool. What made these things possible were the creative people behind the artworks and shows.
“I don’t care about the technology, I care about the idea. Idea always comes first after that we make that idea according to technology, otherwise we’re stuck to technology,” he says.
"Wisdom of Da Vinci: An Immersive AI Experience" will run for two months. It is located on the 3rd Level of One Bonifacio High Street, 5th Avenue, Bonifacio Global City, Taguig. Tickets are priced at P975 for adults and P780 for students.