Asks the question “What is art? “
“The Mechanical Comedian could be described as Schrödinger’s art of the art world.”

The Mechanical Comedian is criticism pointed towards the modern shift in using Ai to replace the natural element in the creation process of art.

It is a work created by Elias Penkkimäki with usage of ChatGPT, and DALL-E 3. A physical part of the art is sculpted and painted and then captured through the lens of a camera. The digital image is sent into the DALL-E 3 through ChatGPT interface. Resulting in revealing the digital counterpart – an echo of a hollow reach for perfection.

The Mechanical Comedian was partly inspired by Maurizio Cattelan’s “Comedian”, for it brings the Comedians ideas into the modern day criticizing current problems in the art world. The Juxtaposition of criticizing the very thing it itself is, makes its comical nature apparent. Yet with it’s physical piece’s simple brutalism The Mechanical Comedian at the same time throws the viewer into the murky waters of our materialist world. A world where the value of human artists and the process of creation suffers in the the hands of the market forces. It displays inevitable disregard for what is truly art when only the end result matters. How the idea gets buried and altered out of the way for nonsensical beauty standards.

The Mechanical Comedian was created by prompting an image generator with an original piece that is used as a 100% full instruction set in hopes of receiving a 1:1 replica. Yet the command led not to a twin, but a distorted sibling, showcasing the flaws and inner workings within “the machine of stolen dreams“. Among other things it asks the questions, who is the artist of the second part of the piece? Just like in Cattelan’s Comedian where the banana and tape are replaced by the staff who are trying to follow the instructions and the underlying idea of Maurizio Cattelan as best as they can, similarly The Mechanical Comedian is the algorithm’s attempt to follow Elias Penkkimäki’s instructions down to the last pixel detailed in the photo of the idea. Yet the algorithm behind the Ai combines the whole art worlds skills inside the digital version. It produces something that has the hand print of everyone yet no one’s whose works have been used in the training dataset.

Some comments from the author:
“I wanted to create something that would inspire discussion of what is true art and why.”
“The minimal and brutalistic look and unworthy material choices of the piece is in the core of the discussion of how art is viewed [by certain people] strictly through the lens of the visual outcome.”
“Why did I create this? I feel like real artists and their works aren’t valued enough. To me The Mechanical Comedian is a mirror piece of the undervaluation of traditional art compared to generative art. Here the digital image in quick glance looks ‘good’ compared to the physical piece in the traditional sense, but what comes to other artists works compared to Ai creations I can’t help but to see the opposite.”
Was this made to prove some point? “Absolutely. Like I said this piece is the very question of what is art in a world where one says its everything and someone else says its nothing.”
“There are so many aspects and ideas you can take from this piece that I cannot even list them all here, but feel free to share how you’d see this.”

The creation process

How the piece was made:
“The physical piece was done outside in -15°C in the middle of snowy winter to give the quickly freezing ‘paint’ some extra texture. Then I drew a banana on it and cut it out with a knife. Yellow tape that was colored mostly black was placed on top of a spring to give it structure of a missing mechanical banana, yet keeping it as minimal and brutalistic as possible.”
“I had access to ChatGPT+ and Dall-E 3 so the image generator was chosen solely based on what I had access to and which accepted my own image as the prompt.”

“Schrödinger’s art? Yeah I’d accept that describtion of The Mechanical Comedian. Like not everyone will think an Ai image can ever be art, or the physical piece doesn’t look good enough for others to see that as art either but the former will vouch their souls for it. So perhaps to others it’s not art, just like to many a banana taped into a wall was never art, but someone else saw the value in it and bought it for $120k.”

The creation process consisted of creating the physical piece and then using it as a 100% prompt for the DALL-E 3 Ai image generator on how it should place the pixel. Due to it’s algorithm instead of a 1:1 copy it resulted in the other half of this piece. This process was done in a single take with no other prompts or editing whatsoever is done to the generated image. No other versions were produced to cherry pick the resulting image. Screenshot of the creation process.

The wish to own something. The sale of this piece is not merely a transaction; it is an invitation to bear witness to the carnival of the machine made art season, where authenticity is questioned, and inspiration is algorithmically assigned. In purchasing “The Mechanical Comedian,” you acquire a shard of this era – a fragment that reflects not just the creator’s intent, but the entire cosmos of contemporary artistry. It is a fight against the windmills of change while it itself is swinging right on top of one.

the Mechanical Comedian, the jester at the court of art, neither fully formed by man nor machine, but a chimera of both. Embrace this harbinger of the new world. A purchase not of mere art, but of a manifesto, a herald of the shifting ethos of expression and the mark of the industrial revolution for content imitating as art.

It’s purpose is to show different aspects of art and encourage people to do and value art. “If you consider The Mechanical Comedian as trash then I beg you to do better art.” “There is never too much good art. And if this inspires other people to bring their ideas alive I’m all for it.”

The Mechanical Comedian now only for 31 000,00 €
Dare to own “The Mechanical Comedian,” and with it, the conversation it incites. The physical art piece, accompanied by the digital image which is bestly served as a projection on the side of the physical piece.

To acquire “The Mechanical Comedian” is to engage with the satire of our existence, to find humor in the abyss, and to recognize the grim reflection staring back from the canvas of our collective consciousness. It is both a statement and a question, an answer and a riddle – a testament to the times we currently live. This piece is a significant part of art history regarding it’s time. Furthermore it is in itself intended to uplift how the whole art community engages and understands art.

If you have questions or comments, you can contact the artist: elias.penkkimaki “at” gmail.com