Iyad Rahwan, born in 1978 in Aleppo, Syria, is an interdisciplinary artist based in Berlin. Drawing on his day job as a computer science professor and Director of the Max Planck Center for Humans & Machines, Rahwan’s art explores the evolution of Artificial Intelligence and its relationship to the human condition.
Formerly a professor of Media Arts & Sciences at MIT’s Media Lab, Rahwan uses generative AI as part of his process, thus incorporating the machine’s own evolving representations of itself and the world. Rahwan is best known for his digital art/science projects, which exposed tens of millions of people to the societal and ethical implications of AI, such as the ethical dilemmas of autonomous vehicles, bias in machine learning, human-AI creativity, media manipulation, and the ability of AI to induce fear and empathy in humans at scale. His work was featured in major media outlets, including The New Yorker, New York Times, CNN, The Guardian, and The Atlantic. It was also exhibited in leading cultural institutions, such as Ars Electronica, Science Museum London and Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum.
Rahwan also has a painting practice. His paintings of humanoid machines capture the complex emotions that AI evokes in us, and explore how physical pigment can capture the ephemeral nature of the algorithms that permeate our lives.
