Museums and Artificial Intelligence Network

As far back as the mid 2000s museums were talking about Artificial Intelligence (AI), however while these technologies have become increasingly pervasive in wider society from voice activated systems such as Alexa to the promise of Tesla's self driving cars, they are only beginning to be explored, in a museum context. With the National Gallery (UK), The Metropolitan Museum of Art (US), American Museum of Natural History (US), MoMA (US), Cooper-Hewitt (US) all beginning to explore the potential of AI this network will bring together a range of senior museum professionals and prominent academics to develop the conversation around AI, ethics and museums.

AI technologies including machine learning, predictive analytics and others, bring exciting possibilities of knowing more about visitors and collections. However, it raises important challenges to ethics. With the increasing awareness and regulations about data usage, museums, must approach AI with both caution and fervour. To successfully achieve this senior museum professionals need to be provided with the opportunity to examine what this model might look like, and the wider impact that museums can have when it comes to advocating for new ethical standards.

This research project will bring together museum professionals and scholars to discuss the cost, and indeed skills required to successfully adopt the true possibilities of AI. Cost and skill, have thus far acted as a barrier for museums, however with these technologies becoming more pervasive and skills more in demand, this is a timely moment for museums to explore the possibilities and ethical challenges of AI across their work from visitors to collections. As such this network seeks to challenge this known issue - ethics as an afterthought - by embedding it into the conversation on AI in Museums at this critical moment. A conversation that will help to inform funders and senior managers about the opportunities and challenges this technology poses for the sector.

The network will have important impacts for policy making across the museum sector, and will support funders particularly in the UK to decide what funding priorities and criteria should be used to catalyse ethically sound, creative and sustainable approaches to the development of AI in museums.

The network will engage with key sectoral bodies including the American Alliance of Museums and the Museums Association, and draw policy recommendations on professional standards and AI, standards that already exist around many other areas of museum practice. Both of which have demonstrated an interest in this nascent area of museum practice, with AAM recently holding a workshop on AI and MA publishing a number of short articles on the topic in their print publication Museums Journal.

The network will support the development of transatlantic interdisciplinary partnerships, that will develop the work of 1) Museums 2) Academics 3) Digital companies. For museums this will mean greater collaborative working, across the sector, and a move away from siloed work culture. For academics this will enable research that is grounded in critical praxis, and responds to current sector challenges. For digital companies, and freelancers attendance at the network will create opportunities for new markets, clients, and business, crucially these opportunities will provide international opportunities.

Skills development is central to this network, and core network participants, and those that attend our workshops in London, New York or San Diego will develop new strategic, and management skills in relation to the development of AI technologies. These skills will ensure that museums and academics are able to write better project briefs in turn ensuring more relevant, ethical, and effective applications of these technologies are created within museums. This will have a wider impact on the museum institution and will help to shape new ways of working, and support the development of more robust and sustainable technology projects.

The work of this network will have wider impacts beyond the museum sector, in that its work will also add to similar conversations in the third sector, namely the charity sector and civil society organisations.

Through dissemination of this networks work, and the public event to be held at the Barbican, this network will open up a new conversation around AI and data distribution, that will help the wider public to become more conscious in how they permit public institutions to collect and use their data.