Dr. Annette Doms
Dr. Annette Doms
About the speaker
Dr. Annette Doms is an internationally sought-after thought leader and bridge-builder who connects academic depth with entrepreneurial practice. As an art historian, she found her path to technological innovation early through digital art; in 2014, she realized UNPAINTED, Germany’s first fair for digital art. As Vice President of the German Federal Association for AI Transformation (VENTURE AI), she actively shapes the discourse around responsible AI and demonstrates how companies can transform technological disruption into sustainable competitive advantage.
She taught the history of digital art at LMU Munich and is a board member of numerous technology institutions. In her publications, such as the work “From Gutenberg to ChatGPT,” she analyzes the interplay of technology, culture, and society. At the beginning of March 2026, the London-based institute citiesabc nominated her as one of the “Top 50 Most Influential Women in AI.”
Metamorphoses
Lecture on March 20, 2026
“Every great technology is a test of human character. AI will be the greatest test of our time.” – Dr. Annette Doms
In her guest lecture, the art historian Dr. Annette Doms explores the genesis of artificial intelligence within an artistic context and raises the question of the essence of creativity in a technologized world. In doing so, she bridges Walter Benjamin’s seminal reflections on the “loss of aura” in modernity with the current debate on the artistic status of generative systems. While Benjamin examined the reproducibility of the ever-same, AI today confronts us with the paradoxical production of the “algorithmic unique.”
At the center of her analysis lies the tension-laden relationship between human intuition and machine authorship: How does the role of the artist transform when the creative process shifts from poiesis (the act of making) to noesis (curatorial thinking)? Doms reflects on the shifting of agency and responsibility and, in a concluding outlook, sketches the future symbiosis of human and machine as a new era of co-creativity.