AMIR FATTAL

Amir Fattal (b. 1978, Tel Aviv, Israel) is an artist and curator based in Berlin. Fattal’s practice is one of reflection grounded in the history of aesthetics and cultural references. Working with new technologies such as AI, 3D printing, and digital animation, his work highlights their effects on creativity.

In his new series, POST ARTIFICIAL PAINTING, Fattal reimagines classic art world scenarios for the 21st century. Fattal starts each work with a series of prompts that coax forth a fictional portrait from the depths of AI’s collective unconscious. He then employs traditional oil painting techniques on canvas to bring these AI-generated images to life, blurring the line between reality and imagination.

Fattal’s series proposes AI prompting as an intriguing new artistic technique in its own right, making one wonder what verbal incantations were used to create these vividly lifelike creatures, who seem to have human backstories of their own. They are, in a word, aspirational, with the subtly coded "je ne sais quoi" of a 21st-century aristocracy—understated, dialed in, self-aware, and breathtakingly precise in their aesthetic. The portraits capture the zeitgeist uncannily, raising questions about how our collective data is used to dream up these non-existent humans and how they reflect our society at large.