Baptiste Caramiaux

I am CNRS researcher (tenured, with HDR) at the Institute of Intelligent Systems and Robotics (ISIR), Sorbonne Université in Paris. I am a member of the HCI Sorbonne group.

I conduct interdisciplinary research at the intersection of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) and Machine Learning (ML). My recent work has focused on interactive and collaborative machine learning with the general public, artists or domain experts, ML-assisted human learning; Human-IA trust, and the study of practices and politics of AI in the creative and cultural sectors.

Alongside my research activities, I have been a scientific expert for the European Commission on AI in the creative sectors. I am a contributing member of the Fronte Vaccuo collective and a laureate of Microsoft Research’s AI and Society program. I hold a PhD in computer music from IRCAM and a Habilitation to Direct Reseearch (HDR) from University Paris-Saclay in 2023.

news

Oct 07, 2025	I’m delighted to give a Keynote presentation at the Dagstuhl seminar on “Augmenting Human Creativity with AI”. My presentation will be about how creative and artistic practices can reshape our relationship with AI, both practically and culturally. Programme and participants: https://www.dagstuhl.de/25442
Jan 07, 2025	Our CHI paper “Generative AI in Documentary Photography: Exploring Opportunities and Challenges for Visual Storytelling” has been accepted at CHI 2025. This research is part of Lenny Martinez’s PhD, co-supervised with Sarah Fdili Alaoui
Oct 01, 2024	Our TOCHI special issue is out! We explore the rich and complex histories of uncertainty in design: philosophical significance, role in algorithmic processes, and importance in prototyping: https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3702322
Mar 01, 2024	I am one of the Microsoft Research AI & Society Fellows for the “towards creative-centred AI” research challence (https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/academic-program/ai-society-fellows/fellows/)
Nov 01, 2023	The volume on “AI in Museums” for which I contributed is in print (linkedin post)

selected publications

"Explorers of Unknown Planets": Practices and Politics of Artificial Intelligence in Visual Arts

Baptiste Caramiaux and Sarah Fdili Alaoui

Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction, Nov 2022

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Alongside recent advances in artificial intelligence (AI), a new art practice has emerged in recent years that borrows and transforms these advances in the production of artworks. The actors of this emergent practice are coming from contemporary art, media and digital arts. These artists have developed an original practice of AI within their creative field. In this article, we propose a qualitative study to explore the nature of this practice. We interviewed five internationally renowned artists about how AI is integrated into their work. Through a thematic analysis of the interviews, we first find that their practice relies on crafting algorithms and data as materials. We uncover how they explicitly use this material unpredictability rather than avoid it. Secondly, we highlight the politics of their practice that consist of resisting the culture of AI research, as well as its inherent power dynamics. We also highlight how their relationship with the technology is imbued with ethics and how they rethink their role with respect to the technology. In this paper, we aim to provide the CSCW community with a way to expand the framework in which AI can be understood not only as a tool but also as cultural and political design material.
Generative AI and Creative Work: Narratives, Values, and Impacts

Baptiste Caramiaux, Kate Crawford, Q. Vera Liao, and 2 more authors

Feb 2025

arXiv:2502.03940 [cs]

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Generative AI has gained a significant foothold in the creative and artistic sectors. In this context, the concept of creative work is influenced by discourses originating from technological stakeholders and mainstream media. The framing of narratives surrounding creativity and artistic production not only reflects a particular vision of culture but also actively contributes to shaping it. In this article, we review online media outlets and analyze the dominant narratives around AI’s impact on creative work that they convey. We found that the discourse promotes creativity freed from its material realisation through human labor. The separation of the idea from its material conditions is achieved by automation, which is the driving force behind productive efficiency assessed as the reduction of time taken to produce. And the withdrawal of the skills typically required in the execution of the creative process is seen as a means for democratising creativity. This discourse tends to correspond to the dominant techno-positivist vision and to assert power over the creative economy and culture.