AI study reveals the secret of an artistic 'hot streak'

Whether an artist, scientist, or film director, trailblazers in particular fields often have a critically-acclaimed'hot streak' where they produce a series of outstanding work in short succession. Now, scientists at Northwestern University in Illinois claim to have pinpointed the secret formula that often triggers a pioneer's best work. Using a form of artificial intelligence (AI) called deep learning, they mined data related to thousands of artists, film directors and scientists to identify a magical formula for success. Hot streaks directly result from years of'exploration' (studying diverse styles or topics), immediately followed by years of'exploitation' (focusing on a narrow area to develop deep expertise), they claim. They define a hot streak as a burst of high-impact works clustered together in close succession – as achieved by artists such as Vincent Van Gogh and Jackson Pollock, or film directors like Peter Jackson or Alfred Hitchcock.