MESSINA – Authentic art cannot be replaced by artificial intelligence, but in the future AI will be at the service of artists, also developing new lines of creativity. This is what emerged in the Santa Maria Alemanna church in Messina, which hosted an appointment of the Cnr-Irib Coffee Talks: ‘Artificial Intelligence – creative dialogues and visual arts’. In comparison, the well-known artist Dimitri Salonia, founder of the Sicilian Coloristic School, who competed in creating works of art with the generative AI of Chat Gpt led by Gaia Roccaforte, biomedical engineer of the Institute of Biomedical Research and Innovation of the Cnr of Messina.
“I’m really enthusiastic – explained Dimitri Salonia -. I think having challenged the computer by capturing the public’s imagination with one of my works has demonstrated that true artists can still overcome the wonders of technology. During the creation I hope he managed to convey not only the excitement in the moment of creation, but also a firm belief in the unrepeatable human inventiveness. I think that artificial intelligence will never be able to reproduce the imperfection or error which nevertheless represents the distinctive trait of an artist and makes the work unique”.
It was the audience present who decreed their consent to maestro Dimitri Salonia. The work portrays a local market: one of the themes often represented by Salonia who, however, created a new version with the collaboration of her student Lidia Monachino. Salonia with her ‘informal figurative impressionistic’ style and her bright colours, the typical features of her art, not only reaffirmed the unique value of human inspiration compared to algorithmic abilities, but also sparked a profound reflection on the place of art and creativity in an era dominated by technological innovation. His works, vibrant with life, color and emotion, testify that art, in its purest and deepest form, is not affected by the most sophisticated artificial creations.
Salonia’s works have always revealed an alchemy of strong and contrasting emotions that manage to strike the soul, to enter a parallel universe: that of colour. “A universe – explains the maestro – that rejects words, labels, formalisms. “Art – continues Salonia – frees man’s personality, constrained and entangled in predefined forms. Therefore a truth drawn by lot from the whirlwind of impulses and not mediated by superficial respectability, by the rigid imposition of rules and laws. The use of colors seduces and envelops, looks at the transparencies, beyond the first impact it reveals images of life. And so you can discover, behind the umbrella of a market, the fruit and vegetable sellers, who emerge from the composition of the whole. It is they who mark, in the collective imagination, the main boundary between nothing and everything; they are the ones who open up extreme sensations in the drawer of memory.”
Gaia Roccaforte of the Cnr-Irib of Messina was also satisfied and explained: “it was an exciting challenge, the AI finished first and respected the chosen theme, creating a very beautiful work from a formal point of view and respecting the selected style. However, I believe that even in the field of art, in the coming years artificial intelligence will improve and be able to be increasingly collaborative with human beings, managing to convey emotions and above all information”.
During the coffee talk, moderated by the CNR technologist director Marco Ferrazzoli, prof. Alfredo Ferro, emeritus of Computer Science at the University of Catania, illustrated the numerous fields where artificial intelligence already plays this role. In particular, in the field of healthcare, as explained by Giovanni Pioggia, Cnr-Irib manager of Messina, and Marco Ferlazzo, President of COT, illustrating “Adapt-Mi – Automatic Diagnosis, Assessment, Prognosis and Treatment of Motor Illness”, a project innovative financed by the Ministry of Business and Made in Italy (Mimit), aimed at the research and development of new personalized medicine and rehabilitation algorithms based on generative AI.
“Artificial Intelligence – states Pioggia – has emerged in recent years as a transformative force in the field of medicine, capable of redefining in certain aspects the way in which we diagnose, treat and monitor diseases, but also – more generally – the way in which we organize healthcare”. “This technology – states Flavio Corpina, CEO of the MHIH Consortium – uses machine learning algorithms and data analysis to process large quantities of medical information quickly and accurately, with the aim of making clinical decisions and contribute to improving patient health outcomes”.
