FW-HTF-P: Exploring Creative Design at the Human-technology Frontier Through the Emerging Artist-technologist Occupation

University Of Rochester, Rochester NY

Investigators

Abstract

Creative skills have been identified as most valuable for future workers across domains, given the expectation that intelligent machines will increasingly replace routine tasks currently performed by people. The creative design process also is changing due to advances in technology, in particular, artificial intelligence (AI) and augmented and virtual reality (AR/VR). What are the creative skills needed for the future workforce, and how can these be best developed and nurtured? This project addresses this question by exploring how advances in AI and AR/VR technology are changing the emerging occupation of artist-technologist. As experts in both arts and technology who see no barriers between these two fields, artist-technologists are in a unique position to design previously inconceivable media products with relevance and applications not only for the arts and entertainment, but many other fields such as education, health care, marketing and new product development. The project involves a diverse group of researchers and practitioners with relevant expertise in the arts, AI, AR/VR, engineering, learning sciences, education, business, entrepreneurship, career education, ethics, and disability in an exploratory study of how specific applications of AR/VR and AI may affect artist-technologists’ creative process, professional identity, overall work experience, preparation, and related equity and inclusion issues. The initial focus of the project is on musicians and composers, and will expand to other artistic endeavors. At the core of the study are exploratory conversations with key stakeholders (conducted in the tradition of customer discovery interviews promoted by NSF's Innovation Corps program), followed by three task forces drawing implications and identifying issues worthy of further research for enhancing future artist-technologists’ design process at the human-technology frontier (future technology focus), effectively preparing future artist-technologists to make best use of AI and AR/VR in their work (future workers focus), and increasing access to this occupation by underrepresented populations (future work focus), respectively. A series of team learning experiences and touch-point events informs this collaborative work, while also supporting the project team in developing the needed cross-disciplinary expertise and strategies. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.