Photo created with AI wins award but author rejects it

After the 'fake' photos of the pope with the feather duster and the arrest of Donald Trump, another case is destined to fuel the debate on generative artificial intelligence.

Among the winners of the Sony World Photography Awards, one of the world's largest annual photography competitions, is a black and white photograph submitted by German photographer Boris Eldagsen.

It is entitled "Pseudomnesia - The Electrician", it is in black and white, it seems to have been taken in the 1940s and portrays two women;

it was first in the "Creativity" category of the Open section.

However, the image was not taken by Eldagsen but generated by Stable Diffusion, one of the most advanced technologies based on artificial intelligence, which creates images starting from a command written by a man.

Eldagsen declined the award, explaining on his blog that he entered the contest to open a debate on the topic and to understand "whether the big photography awards are ready for images created with artificial intelligence: they aren't". answered.

The organizers of the award told BBC News that since Eldagsen has decided to decline the award, they have "suspended activities with him and, in line with his wishes" have "removed him from the competition".

The use of Artificial Intelligence in everything from songwriting and essay writing to development in medicine has been widely debated in recent months and the launch of the ChatGpt software has been the catalyst.

It is not the first artistic prize won by an artificial intelligence: last August a work created by Midjourney won the competition of the Colorado State Fair.