ADAM BASANTA | CHANTIER IA
INTERFACE RESIDENCY: ARTS, LAW AND AI
UDS WELCOMES ARTIST ADAM BASANTA FOR A RESEARCH-CREATION RESIDENCY AT THE FACULTY OF LAW
Starting in January 2024, the Université de Sherbrooke‘s Faculty of Law will welcome artist Adam Basanta for a residency project on artificial intelligence (AI). This 12-week, year-long initiative is part of the vast Chantier IA project headed by Sporobole. In this way, the Université de Sherbrooke and Sporobole are once again joining forces to continue the work of bringing science and art closer together, which began in 2014 with the Interface: art/science program.
In this singular context, Basanta will focus on the interactions between artificial intelligence and the legal system. His artistic project proposes to reverse the dynamic of domination between “Big AI” and communities, by placing artificial intelligence technologies at the service of the latter. The artist’s aim is to develop a research project that will, on the one hand, hollow out the flaws in the legal system and, on the other, turn AI into a weapon in the service of individuals and communities.
“With his rigorous approach, in which he places technology at the meeting point between the different systems that define our social fabric, Adam Basanta is probably the best-placed artist in Quebec to approach the relationship between AI and the law from an artistic point of view.” – Éric Desmarais, Executive Director, Sporobole
“In Poetic Justice, jurist-philosopher Martha Nussbaum explains how the literary imagination is essential to public discourse and debate in a democratic constitutional state. She illustrates how literature deepens our knowledge of the law, and how judges and jurists can also be poets in the course of their duties. My colleagues, Professors Anne-Sophie Hulin and Alexandra Popovici, and I were of the opinion that, to a certain extent that we wanted to explore, this was true of the artistic imagination. And in the face of the ethical, political and societal challenges posed by AI, it seemed only fitting to unite the forces of artistic imagination and legal knowledge. And in the face of the ethical, political and societal challenges posed by AI, it seemed only fitting to unite the forces of artistic imagination and legal knowledge.- Pr. Maxime St-Hilaire
Sporobole thanks the Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec for its financial support. Chantier IA is a new cycle of reflection and support for artistic creation around the challenges of artificial intelligence (AI) that will run until 2026.
ABOUT THE INTERFACE : ART/SCIENCE PROGRAM
A partnership with the Université de Sherbrooke, this long-term residency program brings together artists and specialists in the natural sciences, engineering, humanities and technology.
As part of this scientific and creative development exercise, each artist in residence will be accompanied by a research team for 12 months. Through this interdisciplinary initiative, Sporobole and the Université de Sherbrooke are enabling the artistic and scientific worlds to work together in a mutually enriching dialogue. The agreement provides for the creation of three artist residencies with different UdeS research groups, over a three-year period.
