AI, Curation and Cultural InfrastructuresFriday 13 November 2026, 17:00 – 18:45

Research and Development as Cultural Production

  • Tommie IntronaR&D Platform Producer, Arts Technologies Serpentine Gallery, London

Drawing on Serpentine’s work with advanced technologies, this contribution examines the often invisible research and production infrastructures that underpin AI art-making. It considers how activities such as dataset development, machine learning research, governance design and interdisciplinary collaboration have become integral to the development of ambitious artistic projects. By treating these R&D processes as cultural outputs in their own right, Serpentine has developed approaches that extend beyond the artwork itself to the technical, social and organisational conditions that make it possible. The discussion will consider how this expanded understanding of production broadens the scope of curatorial practice and positions cultural institutions as sites for experimentation, knowledge production and public-interest innovatio

Panel

AI, Curation and Cultural Infrastructures

Friday 13 November 2026, 17:00 – 18:45

Chair: Lívia Nolasco-Rózsás — UCL Computational Media Research

AI, Curation and Cultural Infrastructures examines how artificial intelligence is reshaping the conditions, practices, and infrastructures of contemporary cultural production and curatorial work. The panel brings together perspectives on the ways AI systems intervene in processes of selection, classification, interpretation, mediation, and knowledge production, while also asking how their underlying computational infrastructures transform cultural institutions themselves. Rather than approaching AI simply as a new curatorial tool, the panel considers the material, political, and epistemological conditions through which these technologies operate, including data, platforms, labour, energy, and systems of governance. It explores how curators and cultural producers might critically engage with AI while developing alternative forms of curatorial agency, institutional responsibility, and building the digital commons.

Other talks in this panel