Small step or a giant leap? What AI means for the dance world

As a new show co-created by an AI performer opens in France, industry leaders including Wayne McGregor, Tamara Rojo and Jonzi D contemplate the technology's possibilities and perils

I think AI's going to change everything," Tamara Rojo, artistic director of San Francisco Ballet, told me earlier this year. We just don't know quite how." The impact of artificial intelligence on the creative industries can already be seen across film, television and music, but to some extent dance seems insulated, as a form that so much relies on live bodies performing in front of an audience. But this week choreographers Aoi Nakamura and Esteban Lecoq, collectively known as AE, are launching what is billed as the world's first AI-driven dance production, Lilith.Aeon. Lilith, the performer, is an AI entity, who has co-created the work, with Nakamura and Lecoq. She" will appear on an LED cube that the audience move around, their motion triggering Lilith's dance.

Nakamura and Lecoq insist they're interested not in chasing the latest technology for its own sake but in enhancing their storytelling. Working as dancers with theatre company Punchdrunk turned them on to the idea of immersive experiences, which led to virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR) and now AI. Their question is always: How can we make this tech come alive?" But not in a robots-taking-over-the-world way.