AI on Ryan Kelln

Covenant

Wed, 04 Mar 2026 10:00:00 -0500

An open constitutional work and civic gesture addressing the coexistence of human and emerging intelligences.

Feed the Fires

Tue, 23 Sep 2025 10:00:00 -0400

An AI-driven interactive firepit installation where audiences share stories with a fire spirit that transforms their narratives into immersive experiences.

Experimance

Wed, 30 Jul 2025 18:37:52 -0400

An AI-driven art installation exploring humanity and machine intelligence through a living, responsive sandscape.

Neural Ballet

Sun, 05 Nov 2023 17:36:10 -0500

November 10, 2023
Factory 163
Stratford, Ontario

“Neural Ballet” is a live dance presentation enriched with AI-generated visuals, collaboratively created and performed by professional ballet dancer and award-winning choreographer Irina Lerman, along with software artist Ryan Kelln. It is part of the Provocation Ideas Festival and co-presented by SpringWorks.

This distinctive show weaves a mesmerizing tapestry that includes both neoclassical masterpieces and original contemporary works, specifically crafted for this event. These pieces explore the fascinating intersection of physical artistry and the data streams that pulse through the emerging artificial intelligences redefining artistic boundaries. Venturing into the nuances of intelligence, “Neural Ballet” poses the compelling question: How can movements and gestures, so deeply human, be captured, interpreted, and echoed by the realm of artificial intelligence? Join us for an exploration that dances at the intersection of tradition and innovation, encapsulating the dynamic dialogue between dance and data.

Transmigrations

Thu, 08 Jun 2023 20:22:13 -0400

The Transmigrations live music concert was performed in Toronto on June 9, 2023 at the Toronto Reference Library and November 17, 2023 at Factory 163 in Stratford.

This concert, a collaboration between Dhaivat Jani and Ryan Kelln, is part of the Provocation Ideas Festival, and explores the history of the technological transformation of modern society, the nature of intelligence, and the recent revolution in generative AI tools.

It includes an integrated discussion about the practice of using these tools and how increasingly intelligent and accessible tools will shape economics, politics, and culture.

Ubiquitous Text 2 Image

Mon, 22 Aug 2022 11:07:39 -0400

“buckskin and fur” by Naomi

From August 1st to 6th 2022 the Harbour Collective organized a workshop for six Indigenous Canadian artists where we investigated the latest machine learning / AI art tools, particularly tools that allow text to be transformed into images (text-2-image). The two main tools used were MidJourney and DALLE-2.

During the week, as the participants grew more familiar with the tools, and particularly after we were able to create our own community online on the Discord platform where image prompts and generated images could be shared just with the group, the usage patterns began to change.

Five Directions

Tue, 20 Jul 2021 21:59:45 -0400

The Five Directions tutorial series is a collaboration with Jason Baerg to help educate artists and scholars about the principles, history, current practice and future of machine learning and its use in art practice.

Originally designed for a group of Indigenous artists and scholars as part of a larger project spearheaded by Jason Bearg, this tutorial series is now publicly available thanks to Interaccess.

This is a series of 5 hour-long narrated presentations intended to teach the history, current practice and future of using machines and machine learning (A.I.) to create art. Rather than a how-to guide, the focus is on understanding how to think about and interact with digital data and machine tools ethically.

Sound Escapes

Tue, 20 Jul 2021 21:59:45 -0400

The Sound Escapes concert is a collaboration with Spectrum Music released on July 30, 2021 as a online concert.

Concert streamed on twitch on July 30th at 8pm ET. It is now available on youtube.

Watch the full concert here.

Inspired by the wild and uninhibited beauty of nature, it is a collaboration of 6 emerging composers, an amazing jazz trio and myself. For each piece I have created accompanying visuals; a music video crafted from found footage, local landscapes and generated by machine learning / artificial intelligence, all made with open source software. The concert speaks to a love of nature and the technological revolution that is ahead for humanity. While seemingly at odds, I hope that the alien lens of machine learning provides a new perspective on the wonders of everything non-human and a tool to empower more people to make art. Art that can help us see the beauty that is rapidly disintegrating around us.

AI Art Assistant

Tue, 17 Sep 2019 11:51:07 -0400

I am currently looking for collaborators for a machine learning and art project. Would you like to join me? Continue reading below!

Coding Chaos Concert

Tue, 20 Aug 2019 11:46:10 -0400

The Coding Chaos concert was a collaboration with Spectrum Music performed on May 2, 2019 at The Tell in Toronto, Canada.

Part of Spectrum’s 2019 concert series featuring the Jungian archetypes, this concert represented The Creator, as described by them:

Where will we be when what we create can create us? Technology continues to grow at an exponential rate as we discover new ways to improve our everyday lives - but at what point do we lose ourselves to a technology advanced far beyond our control? In a digital world where technology constantly blurs the lines between fact and fabrication, the Spectrum composers probe the possibility of losing our sense of identity and grasp on reality - or will technology give us room to grow?

How to Build a Self-Conscious AI Machine

Thu, 30 Nov 2017 20:35:19 -0500

Long, but well written article on the development and future of self-aware machines.

We're building a dystopia just to make people click on ads

Thu, 30 Nov 2017 20:03:18 -0500

Inspiring and terrifying TED talk by Zeynep Tufekci about the crisis of building AI to maximize profit from advertising.

Humans and Aliens from Creo Animam

Sat, 25 Nov 2017 15:24:52 -0500

Opening poem for the Creo Animam concert.

It May Not Feel Like Anything to Be an Alien

Mon, 16 Jan 2017 10:14:18 -0500

Humans may have one thing that advanced aliens don’t: consciousness. Super intelligence may only be ethical without consciousness and may not need it.

AI Anxiety

Sun, 27 Dec 2015 21:10:08 -0500

Big-name scientists worry that runaway artificial intelligence could pose a threat to humanity. Beyond the speculation is a simple question: Are we fully in control of our technology?

Research Priorities for Robust and Beneficial Artificial Intelligence

Wed, 11 Mar 2015 21:43:50 -0500

How to maximize the benefits of AI while avoiding potential pitfalls. This article gives numerous examples of such worthwhile research aimed at ensuring that AI remains robust and beneficial.

AI masters Atari games

Thu, 26 Feb 2015 10:00:50 -0500

Using a bio-inspired system architecture, Deep Mind scientists have created a single algorithm (Deep Q-network: “deep convolutional network”) that is actually able to develop problem-solving skills and is able to understand spatial relationships between different objects in an image, such as distance from one another, in such a sophisticated way that it can actually re-envision the scene from a different viewpoint. This type of system was inspired by early work done on the visual cortex. And then they immediately put it to use learning a set of classic Atari video games.

Facebook AI Director Yann LeCun on His Quest to Unleash Deep Learning and Make Machines Smarter

Wed, 25 Feb 2015 23:09:01 -0500

Q&A with one of the people behind deep learning. Good details about machine learning.

The Next Technology Revolution Will Drive Abundance And Income Disparity

Sat, 07 Feb 2015 12:41:52 -0500

Machine learning impact on the economy will be increased productivity and abundance, but far less human labour and judgement. We may need a system focused on more than just efficient production that places greater prioritization on the less desirable side effects of capitalism.

The AI Revolution: The Road to Superintelligence

Wed, 04 Feb 2015 22:34:39 -0500

An incredible, in-depth overview of the thinking around the development and rise of ASI (Artificial Superintelligece).

Robo Hub

Thu, 22 Jan 2015 23:09:19 -0500

Daily news about AI and robotics.

When Will We Worry About the Well Being of Robots

Sat, 17 Jan 2015 19:57:37 -0500

Do you worry about your vacuum? Not in the way where you’re concerned about breaking a valuable object - but in an emotional, empathetic concern for its being? If so, then you’re primed for today’s discussion about the wellbeing of robots! We can personify objects, assigning them human qualities, but will technology get to a point where it DESERVES these moral concerns? Can you imagine a day when you will empathize with your computer or care if it lives or dies?

An Open Letter To Everyone Tricked Into Fearing Artificial Intelligence

Sat, 17 Jan 2015 17:43:07 -0500

If time is money, then the endlessly recycled quotes from Musk and Hawking are a goldmine for harried reporters and editors. What more context do you need, than a pair of geniuses publicly fretting about the fall of humankind?

Computer-based personality judgments are more accurate than those made by humans

Sat, 17 Jan 2015 16:14:03 -0500

This study compares the accuracy of personality judgment—a ubiquitous and important social-cognitive activity—between computer models and humans. Using several criteria, we show that computers’ judgments of people’s personalities based on their digital footprints are more accurate and valid than judgments made by their close others or acquaintances (friends, family, spouse, colleagues, etc.). Our findings highlight that people’s personalities can be predicted automatically and without involving human social-cognitive skills.

Neural Turing Machines

Sat, 10 Jan 2015 10:37:02 -0500

We extend the capabilities of neural networks by coupling them to external memory resources, which they can interact with by attentional processes. The combined system is analogous to a Turing Machine or Von Neumann architecture but is differentiable end-to-end, allowing it to be efficiently trained with gradient descent. Preliminary results demonstrate that Neural Turing Machines can infer simple algorithms such as copying, sorting, and associative recall from input and output examples.