Nonfacial Portrait, 2018-ongoing, Face detection software, camera, computer, monitor, canvas, smartphone, table and wooden panel, Variable dimensions.
Painters are invited to create portrait paintings of a person based on a photograph. The painters had to follow one rule: “AI must not detect any face in the completed painting.”
During the painting process, a camera equipped with three face detection algorithms* monitors the canvas, and a screen informs the painter if a face is detected. The painter uses this feedback to guide the development of the painting. The face of the completed portrait should not be visible to any of the algorithms.
It is tricky. If the portrait is painted too closely to the subject, AI will easily detect a face. Conversely, the more one tries to make it undetectable to AI, the less the painting will be recognized as a portrait of the person. One must find the small visual space that only humans can perceive.
In the installation, each portrait is presented along with the video of the painter’s painting process.
* OpenCV Face Detection, Dlib Face Detection and Joint Cascade Face Detection and Alignment. (before 2024)
* OpenCV Face Detection, Dlib Face Detection and YuNet: A Tiny Millisecond-level Face Detector. (since 2024)
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Nonfacial Portrait (documentation video), 2018-ongoing.
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Nonfacial Portrait (installation view at Seoul Museum of Art, 2018), 2018-ongoing, Face detection software, camera, computer, monitor, canvas, smartphone, table and wooden panel, 600 x 600 x 240 cm.
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Nonfacial Portrait (installation view at Seoul Museum of Art, 2018), 2018-ongoing, Face detection software, camera, computer, monitor, canvas, smartphone, table and wooden panel, 600 x 600 x 240 cm.
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Nonfacial Portrait (installation view at Seoul Museum of Art, 2018), 2018-ongoing, Face detection software, camera, computer, monitor, canvas, smartphone, table and wooden panel, 600 x 600 x 240 cm.
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Nonfacial Portrait (installation view at Seoul Museum of Art, 2018), 2018-ongoing, Face detection software, camera, computer, monitor, canvas, smartphone, table and wooden panel, 600 x 600 x 240 cm.
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Nonfacial Portrait (installation view at Seoul Museum of Art, 2018), 2018-ongoing, Face detection software, camera, computer, monitor, canvas, smartphone, table and wooden panel, 600 x 600 x 240 cm.
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Nonfacial Portrait (installation view at NTT ICC, 2019), 2018-ongoing, Face detection software, camera, computer, monitor, canvas, smartphone, table and wooden panel, 600 x 600 x 240 cm. Production support: NTT ICC.
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Nonfacial Portrait (installation view at NTT ICC, 2019), 2018-ongoing, Face detection software, camera, computer, monitor, canvas, smartphone, table and wooden panel, 600 x 600 x 240 cm. Production support: NTT ICC.
Participated painters:
Lee Yoonsang, Chang Wooju, Ahn Kwanghwee, Yoon Miryu, Yoonjung Kim, Hyein Hong, Cho Yu-jeong, Lee Hyun-Kyung, Kim Dae You, Shinah Lee, Kashima Rikako, Hanaoka Miyu, Higuchi Mai, Shishikura Shinobu, Kagetsu Keisuke, Kim Yunsoo, Kodera Sota, Taoka Tomomi.
Commissioned by Seoul Mediacity Biennale 2018