Christie’s set to host its first auction for AI artworks

Luxury auction house Christie’s has announced the hosting of its first-ever auction for AI artworks. According to its post on X, it mentioned that the upcoming auction is billed to begin on February 20, and will feature works from various artists across the world.

While artificial intelligence (AI) has been seen as a game-changer in various sectors globally, its emergence has also sparked criticism, courting controversies numerous times. For instance, there have been several reports of artists using AI to plagiarize the contents of other artists, passing it off as new works.

According to Christie’s, the auction is titled ‘Augmented Intelligence’, and will be open to the general public, with bidding set to start on February 20 and end on March 5 at its Manhattan gallery. The auction house mentioned that this will be the first-ever auction dedicated to AI-powered art carried out by a major auction house globally.

Christie’s set to auction over 20 artworks

According to its statement, the auction will feature a collection of over 20 AI-powered artworks. The artworks were created by several digital artists including Pindar Van Arman, Alexander Reben, and Harold Cohen, with the auction house noting that the artists are famous for exploring the relationship between human creativity and automation.

The auction will also feature other pioneers in the on-chain art world, with artists like Claire Silver, Refik Anadol, and Holly Herndon Mat Dryhurst donating their works towards the auction. According to reports, the pieces that will be auctioned will be in varieties, ranging from native digital NFTs to sculptures, paintings, and interactive works.

According to Christie’s head of digital art sales, Nicole Sales Giles, the auction is set to showcase the relationship between art and technology. “The auction redefines the relationship between art and technology, showing collectors human agency in the age of AI in Fine Art,” she said. She also mentioned that artists have been known to integrate artificial intelligence into their works in many ways, something they will showcase at the auction.

AI artworks auction tipped for success

With the auction billed to take place in the coming days, the anticipation has shown that it will be a success. While the figures that artists can make from these auctions vary, there is enough belief that they can get mouth-watering offers for their art, considering it is the first of its kind.

One of the art pieces that has been predicted to fetch the largest returns at the auction will be Pinar Van Arman’s ‘Emerging Faces.’ The artwork features a series of physical canvases painted by two AI agents that partnered in 2017 to imagine human faces using generative AI before they are painted. The pieces are some of the few that have been painted autonomously using neural networks, and it is estimated that the artist could recoup about $250,000 for the group of works.

Other works at the auction are expected to be done in real-time, with Alexander Reben expected to use his coding skills to guide his large-scale robot at the Christie’s Rockefeller Center Gallery to paint works on fresh canvas. The experience is expected to immerse the participants in the creation process of the works.

Over the last few years, there has been a big rivalry between Christie’s and its fellow auction house Sotheby’s, with both of them aggressively deepening their roots in the emerging and lucrative world of digital art. Both auction houses have redefined their activities, hosting numerous crypto-centered auctions since 2021, when Christie’s auctioned and sold Beeple’s NFT for a record-breaking $69 million.

After the sale of Beeple’s work, Christie’s redefined its activities, moving from a traditional 257-year-old institution known for handling paintings, jewelry, and historical artifacts to a first-choice auction option in the technological space. The company has also built on that legacy, establishing Christie’s Ventures, a tech-focused venture capital arm in March 2021. It also created Christie’s 3.0, a fully on-chain Ethereum-based NFT art marketplace.

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