Question

A portrait created by artificial intelligence(AI)made a historic appearance on the auction(拍卖)block at Christie’s in New York City this week．It is the first artwork created by an algorithm(算法)to be offered for auction in the world of fine art．

The strange-looking painting of an imaginary man in a dark long dress left the auction block at Christie’s for $432，500 on Oct．25 in New York City．

The portrait—designed in the“Old Master”style of European fine artists from centuries ago—only partially fills the canvas(画布)，leaving empty space around the central figure．It appears to represent a man with an unclear face，dressed in clothing similar to that worn by subjects painted by the Dutch artist Rembrandt van Rijn in the 17th century．

Of course，a computer didn’t pick up a brush and become an artist．The AI that generated(生成)the image had human programmers—a Parisian art team called Obvious．To generate the portrait，titled“Portrait of Edmond De Belamy”，the Obvious team first fed the neural network a diet of 15，000 images painted between the 14th and 20th centuries，to train it to recognize visual elements in fine art，Obvious artist Hugo Caselles—Dupré told Christie’s．The algorithm that eventually created an original image had two parts that worked against each other，called the Generator and the Discriminator．

“The Generator makes a new image based on the set，and then the Discriminator tries to spot the difference between a human-made image and one created by the Generator．The aim is to fool the Discriminator into thinking that the new images are real—life portraits．Then，we have a result，”he told Christie’s．

GAN’s final image was then inkjet—printed on canvas and framed，according to Obvious．At the bottom of the portrait is a mathematical formula(公式)representing the algorithm that created it，Obvious artists wrote on the team’s website．

The goal of the painting and of Obvious，also co-founded by Hugo Caselles-Dupré and Gauthier Vernier，was to prove“artificial intelligence can do more than operate driverless cars or transform industry—it can be creative，”CNBC reported．

1.What does the author think of the portrait?

A. It might frightened away the visitors．    B. It was a breakthrough in history．

C. It was well received by all the artists．    D. It is a masterpiece painted by Christie．

2.How does the portrait look?

A. It is painted with some empty space．

B. The figure wears a strange expression．

C. It is in the style of European fine artists of the time．

D. The figure is dressed in the same way as the Dutch artist．

3.What did the artists do to generate the portrait?

A. They invested $432，500 to buy paintings．

B. They taught the network to learn painting．

C. They worked with the Generator to paint 1 5000 paintings．

D. They input a large number of paintings into the computer．

4.The Obvious team created the portrait to show artificial intelligence can_______．

A. replace human beings    B. be applied in many fields

C. operate driverless cars    D. be better than human beings

Answer

1. B

2. A

3. D

4. B

【解析】

本文是一篇科普类短文阅读。文章主要讲述了一幅具有颠覆意义的肖像画出现在纽约佳士得拍卖行的拍卖台上，卖出天价，但它的创作者却“不是人”。此举颇有历史意义。这幅画作由人工智能创作，是艺术界首次拍卖由算法创作的艺术品。

1.细节理解题。根据第一段A portrait created by artificial intelligence(AI)made a historic appearance on the auction(拍卖)block at Christie’s in New York City this week. It is the first artwork created by an algorithm(算法)to be offered for auction in the world of fine art.可知，此肖像画是一次具有历史影响的，首次亮相。故选B。

2.细节理解题。根据第三段“only partially fills the canvas, leaving empty space around the central figure.”可知，它的颜料仅仅覆盖了部分画布，主体人像周围留出了大片空白。故选A。

3.细节理解题。根据第四段To generate the portrait，titled“Portrait of Edmond De Belamy”，the Obvious team first fed the neural network a diet of 15，000 images painted between the 14th and 20th centuries，to train it to recognize visual elements in fine art，Obvious artist Hugo Caselles—Dupré told Christie’s.可知，艺术家团队先把大量的名画输入电脑，然后由电脑创作画像。故选D。

4.细节理解题。根据最后一段The goal of the painting and of Obvious，also co-founded by Hugo Caselles-Dupré and Gauthier Vernier，was to prove artificial intelligence can do more than operate driverless cars or transform industry—it can be creative，”CNBC reported可知，该次尝试是为了证明人工智能可以应用于其它领域。故选B。