Why the phenomenon of Prisma — is not at all about art
ARTinvestment.RU   29 июня 2016

Users who believe that artists will replace another "combination of neural networks and artificial intelligence" greatly mistaken

App Prisma, which stylized images of the users in the "paintings" in the style of famous artists, is now on everyone's lips. Probably a good half of your friends with iPhone have already managed to work your magic on your photos in Prisma and share the results of their work in Instagram. Just a couple of weeks since launch in the AppStore (it happened on June 11 of this year) Prisma became the most downloaded app in 10 countries — in Russia and in most former Soviet republics (Belarus, Estonia, Moldova, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Armenia, Ukraine). 20-х June, according to the developers, only in Russia "Prism" downloaded 650 thousand people. Among those who have looked at your photo through the "Prism", the Prime Minister-министр Dmitry Medvedev, the soloist of "Leningrad" Sergey Shnurov and even Yevgeny Petrosyan. The Internet is bursting at the rave reviews. Users write that the app turns photos into real paintings — even hang it on the wall. Or, for example, draw an analogy with customized portraits that were previously unaffordable, and now a few taps on the screen — and voila: the portrait, from the artist, ready.

developed by Prisma Alexei detention of offenders (from Mail.ru Group) and his colleagues promise to turn your photos into paintings in the style of van Gogh, Pablo Picasso, Isaac Levitan, Paintings Hokusai, Edvard Munch, Marc Chagall, Roy Lichtenstein, say, or to add a touch of art-деко. This is done with a "unique combination of neural networks and artificial intelligence".

, and so (whatever that means). Maybe Prisma and similar apps to appear on the vastness of the AppStore, in essence, are a more advanced set of already familiar to users of the social networking photo filters. Moreover, Prisma is actually leaves the user even less room for creativity than the usual set of Instagram tools, offering a choice of a limited list of the names of the most famous artists in the world — Chagall, Munch, Picasso, etc.

attributed to the works of art image, processed in a similar way, it is just not worth it. Counts in art innovation, the ability to find new meanings, his own philosophy, new artistic approaches. Not trickery, not drawing a tail or a private chest. The ability to draw "like" or "style someone-то". It's just unnecessary. Art — is that-то new is always more than popular use of visual techniques for the interpretation of specific images and shapes. And this is true not only for photography, but for the original, created in the material of the work. History of art knows many such examples imitative of painting and drawing. But the authors of such works rarely find their own name, remaining in the ranks of the faceless imitation.

of Course, not to mention the fact that, in addition to entertainment features, the Prisma and similar apps carry a certain element of culture and ascribe a larger and larger audience for art. And who knows, maybe with the expansion of the number of such applications work by Wassily Kandinsky, Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, will find a way to the hearts of a generation of smartphones. And Prisma — yeah, it's funny. It's a wonderful success story, an example for startups, the tale about the millions earned in a matter of days. But this is not about art. The true artists Prisma is not a competitor.

by Maria Onuchina, AI
Maria Kuznetsova, AI
Vladimir Bogdanov, AI