Mark Ball, Artistic Director at the Southbank Centre: AI and technology are changing how art is experienced

0:00Mark Ball:Hello and welcome back to the Scaling Europe show presented by DL. I'm Seb Johnson. Today I'm joined by Mark Ruhlmuth, the Artistic Director of the Southlake Centre, the Southlake Centre, which of course I guess has its history rooted in the Royal Festival of 1951. Is that right? It's the 1951 Festival of Britain. Exactly right so 75 years ago this year which is of course super exciting because you are organizing a big anniversary event so look thank you for joining me. Absolutely pleasure. Can you touch a bit about what your role really entails because you know a lot of my audience are in tech are in startups investing can you give a bit of a flavor about what your role entails?

0:41Yeah so I'm the assistant director of the Southbank Centre. The Southbank Centre is a collection of venues in the heart of London on the south bank of the River Thames, that comprises the Royal Festival Hall, 2 ,500 in concert hall, the Queen Elizabeth Hall complex, which contains two different auditorias, an Aikenswirt seat and a 250 seat, the Hayward Gallery, which is one of London's leading contemporary virtual arts galleries, and on top of the Royal Festival Hall, top of the National Purity Library, which is a running library of the largest collection of printed poetry collection in the world.

1:15and we sit within 118 of the states and we could use a program across the year which comprises visual art, classical music, contemporary music, performance and dance, literature and a huge big program as well for audiences to engage with both inside and outside our building and I as artistic director I'm responsible really for developing the shape for that making it have coherence and aligned to a vision and connecting the dots across the whole of the organization so that people want to come to choose the exciting work that we're doing here.

1:52Mark Ball:Amazing. Let's talk about the anniversary then, because it's been 75 years since the Festival of Britain, which was, you know, I think the Royal Festival Hall was actually built as part of that Festival of Britain. And to commemorate it, you're putting on a range of events and a big sort of celebration. Can you touch on what that celebration will look like? Yeah, so with 79 years old, like you said, we started in the 1951 Festival of Britain. And in thinking about what we wanted to do this year, we really look back to what happened 75 years ago. And the Festival of Britain was extraordinary. In the aftermath of World War II, when London was born damaged, when the rational was happening, when there was still blackouts, the Festival of Britain, which was organised by the principal at the Labour government, was a very limited attempt to bring the nation together, to unify the nation together, look at what the future could be.

2:38through the layers of artists but also scientists and technologists of the day and architects and engineers and educationalists and it divided an ablution for how we might live together in the future and it also transformed what was it had a uh 30 bomb damage uh uh south of the new site into what's now become europe's largest art center uh it built as you say the royal festival hall as the one which is the one permanent legacy the royal festival was built as a music console all because the Queen's Horn had been destroyed in the bliss, so London needed a new concept of the world. So what really characterised that moment was it was very optimistic.

3:18It was about really, after the trauma of World War II, it was about bringing people together with a sense of optimism and purpose about how we might live together in the future. And we felt 75 years later that we need to make that case for optimism again. The world is a difficult place at the moment. There's a lot going on from the impact of COVID to the climate crisis, to political instability, to two wars that we're now living with, to a cost of living crisis. And there's a lot to get down to that. But arts and culture is one of the ways in which we can bring people together, and we always have been able to bring people together, to put them into a shared space and to think up to a severe about abuse.

3:56So that's what we're doing this year. we're doing that through a range of very ambitious artistic projects, some of which involve technology, but just to give you a flavour of a couple of those. On the actual day of the anniversary, 75 years ago, we were working with Dan Boyle, who of course created one of those spectacular moments for London and the world in 2012. world. And Danny is working with a team of incredible artists like Gareth Pugh and Carsten McColl and Paulette Randall to create an immersive experience that will take you through 75 years of British youth culture, from Teddy Boris to punk to hip-hop, exploring its impact on the wider British culture of society and a real exploration of the positivity of youth culture.

4:43We're working with Gary LaNicola and the Goldhanger team on a thing called The Rest is Best for the best thing ever being all of the Goldhanger and Rest is podcasts together in a live three-day fun takeover of the whole of the site with all of the Rest is talent that are here, really looking at the future through the lens of all of those individual podcasts, which is going to be pretty extraordinary. And we have an annual music festival called Meltdown. She's always chosen by a famous artist and it's like an artist opening up their record collection and sharing it with the world by throwing their favorite artists across all of our interviews for 11 days.

5:20And this year, we were very fortunate to be able to secure the artists and the artist Harry Styles, who is a global cultural figure. So Harry's going to be with us over that period. Shanae's saying he's a favorite artist, but also performing himself. That and those hundreds of other things that we're doing in London and also across the nation as well. we're working in 40 ,000 cities because the festival of Britain was a national festival. More than three people took part in the festival we've had in 1951 and 8 million people came to this site between May and September 1951. So it was an extraordinary moment and 17 years later, we're running along with that with another series of extraordinary moments that are unified and optimistic about what we can be doing to live together in a better and more aggressive way of execution.

6:08Mark Ball:Amazing. When you look at the Festival of Britain, how much are you taking inspiration from that and that whole celebration of festival versus going in your own direction and trying to do something new and different. Well, I think, you know, we're using that sense of, that spirit of, it's a final question. I'm saying two ways. One is we're using that fundamental spirit of optimism. But also it was a very democratic festival. You know, the Royal Festival Hall, when it was built for the festival, is very unique in music venues. It's two first public space, one third auditorium. So you come down here in the daytime and it's used by families, by kids doing their homework, by drawing groups, by dancers, and we had a little, and we're all this 11-acre estate.

6:47So we're a very democratic convening space. So we wanted to reflect that. We wanted to reflect that sense of optimism. And we also wanted to reflect the sense that in 1951, there was a lot of innovation. You know, it was the first time ever, for example, a computer game was played by the public. In 1951, the financiers built a huge computer they created a computer then called the NIMH and they demonstrated it joined the nicely victim or festival. The first time ever 3D cinema was shown to UK audiences was by a pop-up cinema on this time called the telecinema where and you look at all of the Pathé footage of people putting on there, the red and green glasses and experiencing, you know, incredible thing of watching people moving images in 3D.

7:35So innovation was really part of that so we also wanted to be part of the 50-world program, which is why a lot of old projects are also focusing on technology and the innovation that comes by creating a meeting place between different artistic forms. But of course, we're re-casting all of that for now. It's not a nostalgia fest. It's not about the re-treating 1951. It's about taking the spirit of 51 and re-cursing it for now with all of the artistic innovation, the incredible creative talent who are thinking about the future. And really where we want to end up from doing this this year is to think what it means to be the hot sensory of the future.

8:15You know, 501 was very futuristic, very jet-savvy in some ways. And we want this year to be an exploration of what the long-term future is going to hold to us by working with artists in a different way, by integrating technologies into the program, but also by being deeply down and drastic. So quite a lot of the programme that we're doing is being co-programmed by local communities as well. So we're handing some power to local communities so that they feel there's an offensive connection with them. And all of that we want to continue in the future.

8:47Mark Ball:Amazing. When you talk about, you know, trying to build the future or look towards the future, what role do you see technology itself playing in the world of art and creativity? Well, you know, artists have always been using technology. whether it's, you know, it's finding out of paintbrushes or things which have impacted quite an analogue practice, or in 1951 those examples that I gave you, you know and through the history of the Saabang sensor, the Saabang sensor was the first time editor at Computer was used live in performance sort of places that pre-emergent was formed in 1968 the the first ever electronic music festival, which was created by the BBC Regiophonic Workshop.

9:43And created the fiction from Doctor Who. She was the first person to work on an electronic music festival in the late 62 as well. So innovation has been a part of this part of arts and culture for many years but increasingly because I think technology has facilitated the convergence of different art forms, the different artistic experiences, the convergence of for example screen-based media with wide performance, creating new types of artistic experience using technology is becoming easier and easier. And it's becoming a really significant part of the economy. You know, you look at the impact of something like ApoVoyage, you know, which grows 100 million in 2022 and which has become a global phenomenon.

10:31You know, I think the immersive creative industries in the UK are worth it at 4 million a year. So there's a huge, increasingly it asks us to use technology to create new kinds of experiences which don't necessarily really fix the lead boundaries of art forms, and increasingly audiences, because they've got a mobile phone in that pocket, a super powerful computer in that pocket, are demanding a different type of artistic experience, which is more immersive, often more participative, which gives audiences more agency, and technology can enable that as well. So you see that through a lot of projects that artists are developing, where new types of experiences that give audiences an agency, and that's one of the things that we want to do this year but it absolutely speaks to the legacy of 1951 as well and and what

11:22Mark Ball:role i guess like how are you celebrating that role that technology is increasingly playing in the upcoming festival so uh a couple of ways really one is that we've got some really great uh technology based based projects that are using technology platforms to really enable creativity the scene so we have an annual children's festival uh which is that which happens in in uh in february half terms the uk's largest children's festival it's the north's wheel of new york and their families it's called the mansion and it's always just been within our venue and we always sell out and we're always like how can we make this festival reach more people because the physical capacity of the buildings has reached its capacity we can't actually get more people in And so this year, for the first year, we built essentially a very gamified, interactive music game that allows young girls, between 7 and 11, that gives them compositional skills in a very gamified, playful environment.

12:20And we've just launched a project from Roblox. So really thinking about how do we extend into platforms that people are using as part of their day-to-day lives.

12:29Mark Ball:Secondly, thinking about how we provide a different way into artists who we know in the public are really, really interested in it. So I said it early on, we do a lot. Classical music is one of the things that we do. I did some biggest things we do. We have more, we have since Augustus, numerically, classical music is the largest single art form that we do here. And we work with an incredible pianist called Yuji Wang, who is one of the world's leading pianists. She's an absolute superstar. And our concerts always sell out. We had her here last year. And we were standing around me in the Royal Festival Hall.

13:04And we've been working with Vive Arts and her and a team of artistic and character actors to create a project called Playing With Fire, which is a VR piece which takes you into the world of Yuja, of Yuja Wang, and really looks at her creative process and the music that she's inspired by. and it takes you into a virtual reality environment where she sits at the center of it, looks like where she's playing the piano in a virtual environment. The piano is actually a Steinway stereo, which is one of those pianos that plays itself. And again, it takes you very much into the music that she loves and gives you an insight.

13:49But because it's a VR experience, you can also walk up to Yuja, you can look up to her shoulder, where you can see the way she's playing, give you a very dependent experience. A technology enables that. And the biggest thing that we're doing, I suppose, is setting up a brand new festival called Creative Intelligence, which starts in September this year. And it's the first time we've ever done it, but we feel it's very congruent with all of the things that I've been saying about Legacy of 1951. And we'll hopefully accelerate the sense that Southbank Centre is a space where artists and technologies can grow together, to artists and technologists who work together and thinking about new kinds of art and new kinds of audience experience.

14:29So today it's going to be a three-day festival, so you know, EduSpace and Trust Design, and the first day will be very industry focused. It has a big focus on AI and how AI is shaping artistic practice, but also not skirting around some of the really difficult issues around AI that we know artists are very worried about, but apparently copyright theft. uh uh and the scraping of their material uh uh uh uh but it will fund it will it will it will focus on ai both good and bad in terms of looking at and and i will focus on the kind of creative potential uh and but one of the things that we really want to do with that festival which happened in 51 is to put technology in people's hands and get into play with it and to think about how to think about what the public can experience and understand through accessing demos, accessing working developers.

15:24So the centre of the Creative Intelligence Festival is going to be on the ground floor of the Royal Festival Hall in the area we call the floor boardroom, which is an old Russian 51 boardroom. And it's basically on the farmers market for creative technology. you'll be able to wander from station to station and access work in the development and play with it and understand what it might be able to do and then around that a whole series of talks and exhibitions and then gigs in the evening that we're throwing over as well all really showcasing how artists using technology and pushing our understanding of what artistic fact this can be or what the audience experience can be

16:07Mark Ball:Amazing, it sounds fantastic And how do you think the broader art community has reacted to this? I guess even your own personal thoughts to this kind of wave of AI. And you mentioned there are lots of questions and issues around copywriting and how people who do the creative work can get recognized and paid for it. I'm curious, you know, in my world, I'm always hearing from investors and founders and operators who are in the tech world who are very pro-tech. What's the reaction been like from the artistic and the creative world? Are people very pro and supportive having this whole new speed of tools at their disposal?

16:38is there a lot more skepticism and i don't know is there frustration or concern about

16:43Mark Ball:their creative products like i'd love to hear the side from from the artistic community yeah i i think you know as ever there are people who are uh uh you know very much ahead of the curve who are using ai uh as part as part of as part of their practice to you know uh generatively for image or sound development. And they see it as a really, really essential tool to be able to almost create a whole new set of artistic possibilities. And to also effectively and efficiently automate quite a lot of their work. And there are artists who are kind of leading the charge of that. However, many of those artists, along with a lot of other artists are also deeply worried about, you know, effectively the loss of their intellectual property and therefore the loss of their income by AI companies basically scraping all of their trade-in-law and using it and repurposing it.

17:54And you know, there's been a, you'll probably be aware, there's been a battle royale waging between the artistic community industry and government to really try and ensure that government who, you know, for very understandable reasons, mostly wants the UK to play a very, very leading role in the AI industry, so wants to attract AI investment here. But there's been a real charge for the autistic community to make sure that government is writing in the protections for artists in order, basically, in all of the kind of contractual agreements with AI companies. And, you know, government has been in listening mode.

18:31I don't think it's been acting as quickly as the autistic community would want. But I think only last week, they were looking at this particular issue and really, I think, starting to take more understanding of the fact that, you know, this is also about assist likelihood. And if you cut the ability for artists to earn a living off of their knees, then the creative economy, which is a huge part of UK DLC, one of the fastest growing areas of the creative economy, and now many parts of the creative economy for the first time sit within the government's industrial strategy. If you cut artists' ability to earn a living away from them, then you're really damaged the creative economy.

19:17So there's got to be a balance. uh uh and and just going to be a recognition that that the artists who you know let's be honest most artists are not the big Hollywood owners most artists sort of have fairly precarious living livings living hands and mouth but then uh their face of practice should not be compromised their ability to earn a living should not be compromised by their tracency being stolen uh without the new recognized story yeah i mean yeah and it makes total sense there is this real

19:46Mark Ball:batting of heads going on between the tech community who wants to go faster and lots of people both in the artistic and creative world but also people who are just worried about the advance of AI who kind of want us to slow down. But look Mark, we're all out of time but look thank you so much for your time. I've really appreciated you out there. The festival's going to be an amazing success and it'll be great to get as many tech people out there as possible. Yeah well we'd love to see the tech community come and engage throughout the year but clearly the Tracing Intelligence Festival in September is going to be a yield moment for the second the artistic community to come together and hopefully we'll see a new flower that you can create in the TV in and on itself.