• Taking place May 14, 2026 in New York at the Lighthouse Brooklyn, and supported by Bloomberg Media as the Official Media Partner and Adobe as Presenting Creative Partner.
• Featuring Nicholas Thompson, CEO of the Atlantic, Kathleen Grace, Chief AI Officer of Lionsgate, and renowned architect Bjarke Ingels as speakers, among many more.
• Convening leaders from ElevenLabs, Splice, Spotify, NASA, Replit, frog Design, and MIT Media Lab as AI becomes increasingly embedded in creative industries.

Artist and the Machine today announced its AI & Creativity Summit New York 2026, taking place May 14 at The Lighthouse Brooklyn. Founded by Dani Van de Sande, the event brings together brand leaders, world-renowned artists, researchers and technologists working at the intersection of AI and creative industries as the role of AI shifts from experimentation into production.

Across media, design, music, and entertainment, AI is now being integrated directly into workflows, changing how content is created, owned, and distributed. The Summit is designed to explore this transition, convening the people making these decisions in practice across brands, studios, and research environments.

Adobe joins as Presenting Creative Partner, and Bloomberg Media joins as Official Media Partner across the 2026 Summits in New York and Los Angeles, supporting coverage and distribution through its global newsroom and underscoring growing institutional attention on AI’s impact on creative and cultural sectors.

"We are at an urgent moment when AI is profoundly impacting our self-perception as humans, leaders, and creators," said Dani Van de Sande, Founder of Artist and the Machine. "Every industry is grappling with AI, and the decision to embrace it can't be made in a silo. That’s why we’re cultivating a different kind of conversation that brings pioneers across disciplines into the same room, for a human-centric, creative-first dialogue about AI that moves beyond prevalent narratives of fear, efficiency, and technology. This carefully curated group holds the key to unlocking the next era.”

Both New York and Los Angeles Summits in 2025 were sold out. The recent Los Angeles Summit in November 2025 opened with musician Grimes’ creative and philosophical journey using AI in her artwork. The 2026 New York edition expands to 400 attendees, all selected through a curated application process to maintain a high-signal, cross-disciplinary room. The program brings together leaders across media, research, creative practice, and strategy, placing executives, scientists, and artists in direct conversation around how AI is reshaping creative work in practice. Sessions include:

• The New Brand Imagination: A deep dive into how AI agents and models are reshaping visual storytelling and world-building, and how brands translate their DNA into generative systems without losing coherence or authorship.
• From Generative to Production: A conversation with VFX leaders on how AI has moved from novelty to frame-level creative control, and what that unlocks across film, advertising, and beyond.
• Flourishing with Machines: On how constant interaction with AI systems reshapes human creativity and well-being, and what it means to flourish in hybrid human-machine environments.
• Stop Selling AI Content: As outputs become commoditized, the value shifts toward process. A session exploring how creation itself becomes the product and what that means for creative industries.
• Embodied Intelligence and Design: Moving beyond capability into form, exploring how intentional design decisions shape what AI systems become in the physical world.
• Voices of the Impossible: Unlocking entirely new creative formats with Voice and Sound, featuring experiences that were unimaginable just a year ago.

Confirmed Participants

Speakers include Kathleen Grace (Chief AI Officer, Lionsgate), Nicholas Thompson (CEO, The Atlantic), Bjarke Ingels (Founder, BIG), David Rager (Creative Director, NASA), Ari Kuschnir (Founder, m ss ng p eces), King Willonius (AI Story-teller, Comedian, Filmmaker), Haya Odeh (Co-founder & VP of Design, Replit), Sinead Bovell (Futurist & Strategic Foresight Advisor), Francis Pierrel (Partner & CEO, LR Paris), Marcus Frödin (VP Engineering for Music, Spotify), Benjamin Benichou (Founder, ©3.11LABS), Matt Zien (KNGMKR Labs), Kakul Srivastava (CEO, Splice), Nina Hawkins (Creative Technologist & Founder, Lilium Labs), Hilary Mason (CEO and Co-Founder, Hidden Door), Chris Neff (Global Chief AI Officer, Anomaly), Don Allen Stevenson III (Creative Technologist and Futurist), Kristen Bender (VP, Digital Innovation Strategy & Business Development, Universal Music Group), Ceej Vega (Founder & Creative Technologist, Vega Studio), Doug Shapiro (Founder, Doug Shapiro Media), Alex Henning (Academy Award Winner, Best Visual Effects), Habib Zargarpour (BAFTA Award for Best Special Visual Effects), Coco Mao (CEO & Co-founder, OpenArt), Craig Elimeliah (Chief Creative Officer, Code and Theory), Leonardo Giusti (Chief Design Officer, Archetype AI), Zan Gilani (Director of Product Management, Duolingo), Inna Lobel (Head of Industrial Design North America, frog), Pat Pataranutaporn (Cyborg Psychology Research Program, MIT), Fabien Giraud (Artist), Anthony Lupo (Chairman, ArentFox Schiff), Farah Ahmed (President & CEO, Fragrance Creators Association), Matthieu Befve (Head of Fine Fragrance North America, Givaudan), Lauren Ducrey (Poet & AI Strategist).

Sponsors confirmed to date include Adobe, Replit, ElevenLabs, Luma, AWS, LTX, Epidemic Sound, frog Design, AWS, OpenArt, FLORA, Bria, ArentFox Schiff, Fragrance Creators Association, and others.

Format

The Summit runs as a full-day program across two stages and a dedicated workshop track. The Main Stage features keynotes, fireside conversations, and panel discussions. The Machine and Human Stages offer hands-on workshops, live workflow demonstrations, discussions and tool deep-dives for practitioners, hosted by pioneering artists. An all-day networking program runs in parallel throughout the event.

About Artist and the Machine

Artist and the Machine is the leading Summit at the forefront of AI & Creativity. The bi-annual gathering in New York and Los Angeles is known for its elevated, strong curation that fosters inspiration and partnerships across creative innovation leaders, artists, and founders pioneering the future of creative Human-Machine collaboration. The New York AI & Creativity Summit on May 14, 2026 will gather 400 handpicked leaders in the space, featuring a Main Stage, bespoke breakout sessions & workshops, and interactive demos. If you’re exploring how AI is transforming creative work, you’ll want to be in this room.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260429282742/en/

Every industry is grappling with AI, and the decision to embrace it can't be made in a silo. That’s why we’re cultivating a different kind of conversation that brings pioneers across disciplines into the same room.