A ghostlike portrait created by a teenager’s computer code sold at a Christie’s auction last month for $432,500 — and he probably won’t see a cent of it.
Robbie Barrat posted a recipe for artificial intelligence online not long after graduating from high school that was allegedly picked up and slightly altered by a Parisian art collective called Obvious, Wired reported. The code was then used to create the piece of art, titled “Edmond de Belamy, from La Famille de Belamy.”
At first, Barrat was frustrated — to say the least —when he learned about Obvious and the art they created with his code, but he was beside himself after learning how much it sold for.
left: the "AI generated" portrait Christie's is auctioning off right now
right: outputs from a neural network I trained and put online *over a year ago*.
Does anyone else care about this? Am I crazy for thinking that they really just used my network and are selling the results? pic.twitter.com/wAdSOe7gwz
— Robbie Barrat (@DrBeef_) October 25, 2018
Barrat told Wired he posted his code online to “help and inspire others” but that Obvious went too far by profiting from recreating his work.
“It’s a very awful situation,” he said.
Barrat taught himself to code and work with neural networks to create artworks and music out of his West Virginia home. His dabbling into the world of AI art are built off a technique known as Generative Adversarial Networks, which was created by Google.
At first, Obvious tried to say the piece was created using their own network, but LinkedIn profile interactions showed that one member of the French group, Hugo Caselles-Dupré, “repeatedly prodded Barrat to update his code,” Wired reported. Months later, Obvious credited Barrat for creating the code — a day before the auction.
Thanks for reading InsideHook. Sign up for our daily newsletter and be in the know.
