Award Winning 'Human Movie' and Hypothetical Image Reading, Eryk Salvaggio

The Hypothetical Image: Reading the Artifacts of Generative AI
(Included HUMAN MOVIE screening)

In an artist talk that unravels the mysteries of generative artificial intelligence, the artist and researcher Eryk Salvaggio (Human Movie) discusses glitching and misusing AI products to produce new kinds of visuals and a critique of AI informed by practice. While describing the underlying mechanisms of AI to audiences in a beginner-friendly way, illustrated by his work, Salvaggio explores the tensions involved in today's creative technological practices.

Winner, Short Film Category, New York Short Cinema Awards; Winner, Best Animated Short, Columbus International Film & Animation Festival '25

Human Movie raises an existential set of questions about how we define humanity in the age of AI, and what AI can tell us about ourselves; An award-winning 35-minute lecture-performance contrasting computational processes of AI with the human metaphors used to describe them. Created from glitched AI-generated video, archival and found footage and narrated in-the-moment by the artist himself, Human Movie is informed by the artist’s technical understanding of the role of visual noise in AI systems. It aims to raise thoughtful questions about how we imagine ourselves and how we project this imagination onto machines. What lurks beneath the surface of this impulse? The presentation concludes what is often a lively discussion with the audience. Winner, Short Film Category, New York Short Cinema Awards; Winner, Best Animated Short, Columbus International Film & Animation Festival, 2025.

At a moment when artificial intelligence is transforming how images, information, and decisions are produced, the series asks what forms of human perception, judgement, and interpretive agency remain essential, and how they are developed, recognised, and sustained within education, culture, and industry.

The Cambridge Lectures on Art and Intelligence are rooted in the ideas that underpin David Hockney’s sustained inquiry into perception, perspective, and the cultural power of images. Across his work and writing, David Hockney has consistently challenged the assumption that there is a single, neutral way of seeing, arguing instead that technologies of vision, from painting and photography to film, television, and now digital systems, actively shape how reality is understood, shared, and governed.The Cambridge Lectures on Art & Intelligence extends this inquiry into a wider public conversation at a time when the continued public presence of his work will form a major exhibition at the Serpentine North.

Eryk Salvaggio is a blend of hacker, artist, curator, and technology researcher: a Gates Scholar researching AI and the humanities at the University of Cambridge and an Affiliated Researcher in the Machine Visual Culture Research Group at the Max Planck Institute, Rome. Working intentionally with the technology he critiques, his award-winning films made "with and against AI" have been screened on five continents. He has given talks at the Centre Pompidou (Paris), The Photographer's Gallery (London), the SXSW Festival (Austin), and many more. He writes at cyberneticforests.com. 

Rather than positioning art as illustration or enrichment, The Cambridge Lecture Series on Art and Intelligence treats visual culture as a serious cognitive and social force, one that shapes how societies organise knowledge, authority, and innovation. It reflects a shared concern between MODO and ACE CIC that as systems become more automated, forms of human thinking rooted in perception, interpretation, and judgement must not be marginalised.

The Cambridge Lectures on Art & Intelligence is conceived as a multi-year public inquiry, with the series planned to continue over the next three to five years. Future programmes are expected to bring together a broad range of contributors spanning education leadership, research, cultural practice, and applied fields, building a sustained conversation rather than a one-off event.

The lectures are not framed as a debate about technology. Instead, they offer an inquiry into how human intelligence has evolved through changing image systems, and how it might continue to do so under conditions of rapid technological change.

MODO, is the independent Cambridge gallery that specialises solely in the work of David Hockney, we have announced the launch of The Cambridge Lectures on Art & Intelligence, a new public lecture series developed in collaboration with Art and Culture Education CIC (ACE CIC).
Ticket sales from the series support ACE CIC, a not for profit organisation working to address the systemic marginalisation of the arts within education, and to strengthen the conditions in which inventive and expansive thinking can develop.
The lectures will take place again in Cambridge in 2027, with further programmes relating to the NOW! The already expansive 2027 Speakers list will be announced following this years series.

The support has been inspiring, thank you!!!!!
This event is delivered in support of Arts Festival Cambridge 2026. The festival highlights the city’s arts landscape, inviting residents and visitors to spend time with new work and ideas, while creating meaningful ways for local businesses to take part in Cambridge’s cultural life. Year on year, it continues to grow as a platform for the city’s artists, galleries, and cultural organisations.

Know what’s Happening Next — before everyone else does.

Get App

Host or Publisher MODO