Lessico Di Etica Pubblica
2024

Ethical and Aesthetical Questions on Stock Images: The Case of AI’s Depictions

Romele, Alberto, Sabina Rosenbergova, and Dario Rodighiero

https://www.eticapubblica.it/alberto-romele-dario-rodighiero-sabina-rosenbergova-ethical-and-aesthetical-questions-on-stock-images-the-case-of-ais-depictions/

In this article, the authors deal with stock images depicting AI as a face or a body that undergoes a process of fragmentation into particles, pixels, or voxels. These images, they contend, are the symptoms of a datafied worldview. In the first section, the authors discuss stock images of AI and account for their qualitative-quantitative analyses of about 7,500 images from the online catalog of Shutterstock. These analyses have brought out datafied faces and bodies as one of the main themes among stock images of AI. In the second part, the authors elaborate on the notion of datafication of the worldview and offer some examples from architecture and design. This second section includes a methodological detour, in which the authors propose articulating Panofsky’s iconology and Didi Huberman’s “symptomatic” perspective. In conclusion, the authors reflect on an apparently marginal aspect of stock images of AI: the abundant use of blue.