Art Based Future – Why Societies Need the Arts for Surviving in the Digital Age?

The technological revolution is speeding up. Artificial Intelligence, robotics and genetic engineering are about to dramatically change private life and entire societies. Many experts predict that, due to automation and digitization, up to 50 percent of the now existing jobs are in danger to be discontinued in the next 20 years.

For the first time in the history of civilization, machines are replacing not just human muscle power but complex human thinking. Manmade self-learning machines seem to get in direct competition with humans in fields, which were believed to belong exclusively to the sphere of humans. Will we have to re-define the term ‘human work’? What does this mean for education when its primary goal – employability – takes on a different meaning? How will we have to re-think the role of mankind in a world, which is increasingly controlled, created and dominated by evolutionary algorithms and synthetic biology? Can a new understanding of the arts become a necessary catalyst in times of fundamental societal and economic changes?

Speaker Biography

Gerald Bast serves as president of the University of Applied Arts Vienna since 2000. After studies in law and economics, he earned a Doctorate in Law. He is member of the European Academy of Arts and Sciences and board-member of the European League of Institutes of the Arts. As university president, Dr Bast initiated various new programs focusing on cross-disciplinary teaching and research, like ‘Social Design’, ‘TransArts’, ‘Applied Studies in Art, Science, Philosophy and Global Challenges’ and a PhD program in art-based research. He founded the ‘Angewandte Innovation Lab’ at the University of Applied Arts Vienna, accentuating the role of the arts in innovation processes by facilitating cross-disciplinary intellectual and aesthetic intercommunication.

Dr Bast published in the fields of university management as well as educational and cultural policy and he held lectures on the role of universities and cultural knowledge for societal development and numerous institutions, among them Johns Hopkins University Washington D.C., Columbia University NYC, Tsing Hua University Beijing, TongJi University Shanghai, City University Hong Kong, Lakit Kala Akademi New Delhi, University of Porto and the European Culture Forum Brussels.

Event Details
Date and Time
9 Apr 2018 (Mon)
5:00 PM – 6:00 PM
Refreshments will be served after the event at 6:00 PM.
Venue
ADM Auditorium Level 2
(View map)
Event Format
Keywords
AI, Artificial Intelligence, Automation, Robotics, Society