As part of their AI for Good Global Summit, the UN has explored the role of artificial intelligence in the creation of art, putting forward a call for "AI-powered" artwork from creators across the globe. Really, almost anyone with enough patience, basic IT capacity and the desire to learn could scribble off some machine learning-based art. WIRED's Tom Simonite did it with open source tools and the same machine learning software used by researchers at Facebook and IBM. You can try it too, with premium and free programs, like Runaway ML, GANBreeder, Magenta and Processing. In truth, it's the machine learning programs, such as the popular generative adversarial network (GAN), that do the art, not you.

Two paintings up for auction in New York highlight a growing interest in artificial intelligence-created works -- a technique that could transform how art is made and viewed but is also stirring up passionate debate. The art world was stunned last year when an AI painting sold for $432,500, and auctioneers are keen to further test demand for computer-generated works. "Art is a true reflection of what our society, what our environment responds to," said Max Moore of Sotheby's. "And so it's just a natural continuation of the progression of art," he added. Sotheby's will put two paintings by the French art collective Obvious up for sale on Thursday, including "Le Baron De Belamy."

AI has moved into the art world. Two paintings up for auction in New York highlight a growing interest in artificial intelligence-created works – a technique that could transform how art is made and viewed but is also stirring up passionate debate. Last year, the art world was stunned when an AI painting sold for US$432,500, and auctioneers are keen to further test demand for computer-generated works. "Art is a true reflection of what our society, what our environment responds to," said Max Moore of Sotheby's. Sotheby's will put two paintings by the French art collective Obvious up for sale this week, including "Le Baron De Belamy."

This paper examines five key questions surrounding computer generated art. Driven by the recent public auction of a work of "AI Art" we selectively summarise many decades of research and commentary around topics of autonomy, authenticity, authorship and intention in computer generated art, and use this research to answer contemporary questions often asked about art made by computers that concern these topics. We additionally reflect on whether current techniques in deep learning and Generative Adversarial Networks significantly change the answers provided by many decades of prior research.

In 1913, the largest and most influential art show in history took place; The 1913 Armory Show. Packed into New York's 69th Regiment Armory on Lexington Avenues between 25th and 26th streets were over 1200 works of art that ranged from sculptures, paintings and decorative works by over 300 artists from America and Europe. The show introduced Picasso, Matisse, Duchamp and modernism to American audiences. The event was so radical at the time, critics, who were used to realism in their art, questioned the sanity of the artists whose works were represented in the show. But the experimental art was eventually embraced by America and made way for great American artists such as Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko and Andy Warhol.

On Thursday, the AI-generated "Portrait of Edmond Belamy" sold for $432,500--some 45 times its estimated value--in a sale trumpeted by Christie's as the first auction to feature work created by artificial intelligence. It's a moment likely to be marked in the timeline of both AI and art history, but what, exactly, does the sale signify? For the AI community, the Verge's James Vincent writes in the days preceding the bidding war, the auction provoked controversy among those who argued that the humans behind the canvas (a trio of 25-year-olds best known as the Paris-based art collective Obvious) relied heavily on 19-year-old Robbie Barrat's algorithms yet failed to sufficiently credit him. If the work was truly authored by this string of numbers and letters, does it matter who built and trained the AI? And, given the relatively blurred, imprecise vision the portrait--which Vulture art critic Jerry Saltz scathingly describes as "100 percent generic"--offers of its dour-looking subject, does "Edmond Belamy" even deserve a place in the art history canon? There are no straightforward answers to these questions.

A painting created by artificial intelligence sold for $432,000 at the Christie's Prints and Multiples art auction in New York. The piece, called "Portrait of Edmond Belamy," is the first artwork made entirely by AI to go up for sale at a major art auction. It was expected to fetch between $7,000 and $10,000, making the $432,000 haul quite the shocker. The painting was the work of a type of algorithm known as Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs) that was devised by a Paris-based art collective called Obvious. The group fed the algorithm a data set of about 15,000 portraits painted between the 14th and 20th centuries.

Christie's has sold a portrait painted by an AI for an eye watering $432,500. The AI-generated'Portrait of Edmond Belamy' depicts a slightly blurry, chubby man in a dark frock-coat and white collar. Christie's said the winning bidder wanted to remain anonymous, but confirmed the price skyrocketed after a five way bidding battle on the phones and via ChristiesLive. Pierre Fautrel, a member of the French art collective Obvious, poses in front of'Portrait d'Edmond Belamy,' an image created using Artificial Intelligence'Behold the future--here it is,' the auctioneer declared before the bidding started on the piece. The artwork is one of a group of portraits of the fictional Belamy family created by a Paris-based trio of 25-year-olds known as Obvious. According to an online catalog on Christie's website, the painting had been estimated to go for $7,000-$10,000.

Auction house Christie's made headlines last year with the record-breaking $450m sale of Leonardo da Vinci's Salvator Mundi. Tomorrow's sale of the Generative Adversarial Network's Portrait of Edmond Belamy will likely be a far less significant event, but it could signal a changing of the guard in the art world as the Old Masters give way to a technology-dominated future. The sale of Portrait of Edmond Belamy will be another huge milestone for Christie's. This will be the first time in history that a piece of artwork generated by artificial intelligence (AI) will go up for auction. The picture depicts a blurred man in a white shirt and dark jacket, standing off centre.

With AI becoming incorporated into more aspects of our daily lives, from writing to driving, it's only natural that artists would also start to experiment with artificial intelligence. In fact, Christie's will be selling its first piece of AI art later this month – a blurred face titled "Portrait of Edmond Belamy." The piece being sold at Christie's is part of a new wave of AI art created via machine learning. Paris-based artists Hugo Caselles-Dupré, Pierre Fautrel and Gauthier Vernier fed thousands of portraits into an algorithm, "teaching" it the aesthetics of past examples of portraiture. The algorithm then created "Portrait of Edmond Belamy."