GRIMES: LA Summit Announcement
All of us here at Artist and the Machine are psyched to welcome Grimes to our LA Summit! A provocateur and philosopher, Grimes has been both criticized and lauded for her theories on AI, futurism, and luxury communism. She is the first major recording artist to license her voice for public use.
Recently, Grimes teamed up with filmmaker Matt Zien on “The Tutorial,” a behind-the-scenes look at how she is using AI to create music and videos. In the trailer for “The Tutorial,” Zien promises to walk viewers through “every step… every single program we use, so that you can start doing this yourself.” Zien is is the founder of KNGMKR Labs, a creative studio working at the intersection of cinema, technology, and culture. For the LA Summit, Grimes and Zien will hunker down for a wide-ranging talk about how machine intelligence can boost human creativity.
INSIDE THE MACHINE will be moderated by Ben Relles, a creative executive and entrepreneur who has built a career at the intersection of video and technology. This past year, Relles partnered with Reid Hoffman to create Reid AI, a digital twin that won the 2025 Webby Award for Best Use of AI in Video and Film.
INTRODUCING GRIMES:
INSIDE THE MACHINE
Join Artist and The Machine as special guest Grimes and collaborator Matt Zien sit down with Ben Relles for a deep dive into their creative process. Our LA Summit Opening Keynote, Grimes: Inside the Machine will give an inside look at the making of Grimes and Matt’s recent AI-fueled projects, including their new music video Artificial Angels. Together, they’ll explore how human imagination and machine intelligence converge in her creative process, and the evolving philosophy shaping the future of artist–machine collaboration.
ABOUT THE SPEAKERS
Grimes is a multidisciplinary artist who came to prominence with her album visions which she produced herself in GarageBand. This was followed by the critically acclaimed album Art Angels and the critically disliked (but much better-performing album) Miss Anthropocene, which were also both fully self-produced. Some of her other artistic pursuits include scoring the Emmy-winning opening credits of the Netflix series Hilda and voicing a popstar cyborg in the video game Cyberpunk 2077. As a live act, she started out with many years of van touring but has worked her way up to a festival headliner. Grimes is also a visual artist, often directing her music videos. She’s had one of the most successful NFT drops of all time and is known for her work in the digital art space. Her work with the AI music generation app Endel won the Apple Watch app of the year in 2020. A provocateur and philosopher, Grimes has been both criticized and lauded for her theories on AI and futurism, among other topics.
Matt Zien is a Los Angeles–based filmmaker and Cannes-selected producer whose work bridges traditional documentary and the emerging world of AI-driven cinema. Before co-founding KNGMKR Labs, Zien was SVP of Development and Creative Director of IPC (part of Sony Pictures Nonfiction), developing and producing 200+ hours of nonfiction television. His body of experimental and award-winning AI films, including Post-Scarcity Blues and Last Call Before AGI, are known for their emotional realism and cultural insight, reflecting his broader mission to use innovation in service of human meaning rather than spectacle. He is the co-creator of the “The Tutorial,” a collaboration with the artist Grimes.
Ben Relles is a creative executive and entrepreneur who has built a career at the intersection of video and technology. This past year, he partnered with Reid Hoffman to create Reid AI, a digital twin that won the 2025 Webby Award for Best Use of AI in Video and Film. Previously, Ben spent a decade at YouTube, building new content with the platform’s most inventive creators and channels. Ben first developed his YouTube chops as a creator himself who started The Key of Awesome and co-founded Vsauce, channels that combined have more than 10 billion views. Ben also created Good to Vote, a non-partisan campaign in partnership with HeadCount.org that has registered more than 400,000 new voters by working with creators and musicians. He holds degrees from the University of Wisconsin and the Wharton School of Business.
We’re almost at capacity….secure your spot for 11/19 before it’s too late.
Check out the full agenda here.
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Til next time,
Dani Van de Sande (Founder) & the Artist and the Machine team.
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Paige Piskin is an award-winning AI and XR creator, known for pushing the boundaries of digital makeup, character design, and augmented reality experiences. With AR effects generating more than 300 billion impressions, shared 2 billion times, Paige has worked with major brands like Netflix, Bratz, Warner, and Coldplay, bringing immersive storytelling to life. She has also been a guest judge for Netflix, consultant, and 2x hackathon winner, recognized for her innovative work in AI-driven AR experiences. Paige is passionate about blending generative AI with character design, expanding the possibilities of digital self-expression and interactive storytelling.
Claire Silver is an anonymous AI-Collaborative artist that works with oil, acrylic, collage, photography, and different digital mediums to create her work. She often blends the classical style and mythos into her art, collaboratively producing work that feels at once familiar and strange. Her work explores themes of innocence, trauma, the hero’s journey, and how our view of them will change in an increasingly transhumanist future. Claire’s art can be found in the permanent collection of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, has been at Sotheby’s London and Christie’s New York and in galleries, museums, and festivals all over the world. Featured in the New York Times, WIRED, Fortune, NPR, and countless podcasts, Claire takes every opportunity to explore her unending fascination with AI, fight for visibility for this budding art movement, and wonder at the magnitude of this moment in history. She often feels like a caveman painting fire. Claire is vocal in her belief that with the rise of AI, for the first time, the barrier of skill is swept away and that in this evolving era, taste is the new skill.