UNESCO gathered an international group of experts, artists, and innovators to explore one of the most urgent questions of our time: how can artificial intelligence support culture instead of overshadowing it?
The result is the Report of the Independent Expert Group on Artificial Intelligence and Culture (CULTAI), a landmark document released ahead of MONDIACULT 2025, the World Conference on Cultural Policies and Sustainable Development. The report examines how AI is reshaping creativity, heritage, and cultural ecosystems across the world. It offers a roadmap for ensuring that technology advances human imagination instead of replacing it.
Among the contributors was our very own Brendan Ciecko, Founder and CEO of Cuseum, who joined leading thinkers from around the globe to discuss the role of ethics and cultural diversity in the development of AI policies. Together, this group brought perspectives from academia, the arts, public policy, and the tech sector, constructing an open dialogue between disciplines and perspectives that rarely share the same table.
Brendan’s Perspective: Keeping Culture at the Center of Innovation
Brendan Ciecko brought the view of someone who has spent years helping museums, zoos, aquariums, and cultural institutions navigate digital change with purpose and creativity. His input reflected the same optimism and clarity that guide his work at Cuseum every day.
Brendan’s main idea is that technology should expand what culture can do, not limit it. He spoke about how AI and digital tools can help cultural organizations build stronger connections, reach new audiences, and operate more sustainably — all without losing the human spark that makes culture meaningful.
People before platforms. Brendan emphasized that technology works best when it amplifies human connection. Tools should help institutions bring people closer to art, history, and ideas instead of adding more barriers and levels of unnecessary sophistication.
Using data with care. Drawing on Cuseum’s experience with digital memberships and engagement tools, he underscored the importance of handling cultural data responsibly. Ethical use, transparency, and respect for privacy are what make digital trust possible.
Digital transformation as cultural preservation. Brendan also highlighted that digital innovation can be a force for sustainability. Solutions like digital membership cards and mobile passes reduce waste, cut costs, and help keep participation active in a changing world.
His contributions to the CULTAI report reflected an approach that’s both practical and hopeful, a belief that when used thoughtfully, technology can strengthen creativity and the cultural experiences that connect us all.
While Brendan’s perspective brought a practitioner’s view from the cultural technology field, he was far from the only voice shaping the CULTAI report. The publication reflects the combined insight of artists, scholars, policymakers, and innovators from around the world. The following highlights capture some of the most compelling ideas shared by members of the Independent Expert Group.
1. Salim Dada – “AI Must Protect the Plurality of Human Expression”
Salim Dada is an Algerian musician, composer, and cultural policy expert. He currently serves as Chair of the National Council for Arts and Literature in Algeria and has advised UNESCO on cultural policy and diversity of expressions across the MENA region. His work bridges the arts, governance, and international collaboration.
As Chair of the Independent Expert Group, Dada shaped the philosophical backbone of the report. He presents AI as both a creative ally and a cultural hazard. Algorithms, he argues, are never neutral; they mirror the assumptions and biases of those who build them. When design ignores diversity, technology tends to reproduce the dominance of a few voices while silencing others.
He calls for international standards that guarantee algorithmic diversity and transparency. For Dada, the ultimate goal is to make AI a tool that nourishes pluralism and cultural coexistence. Museums and cultural institutions, he suggests, have a vital role to play in ensuring that digital storytelling and datasets remain inclusive, reflecting the full range of human experience.
2. Mercedes Bunz – “Cultural Data Is a Collective Common Good”
Dr. Mercedes Bunz is Professor of Digital Culture and Society at King’s College London, where she co-leads the Creative AI Lab in partnership with the Serpentine Galleries. Formerly a journalist at The Guardian, she has become one of Europe’s leading thinkers on technology, ethics, and digital infrastructures.
In her contribution, Bunz introduces the concept of cultural data as a shared human inheritance. She distinguishes between ordinary digital data and the collective expressions that document humanity’s creative life, including languages and archives, artworks and rituals. She calls for governance systems that protect this data from commercial exploitation while redistributing the benefits of AI fairly across societies.
Bunz’s argument reframes the digital economy as a moral landscape. Treating cultural data as a common good requires ethical stewardship rather than ownership. For museums and archives, her ideas offer a roadmap for how to digitize and share cultural material without detaching it from its social and historical meaning.
3. Octavio Kulesz – “The Creative Economy 4.0 Must Empower Small Players”
Octavio Kulesz is an Argentine philosopher, digital publisher, and director of Teseo, one of Latin America’s pioneering electronic publishing houses. He advises organizations such as UNESCO and IFACCA on digital cultural policies and has written extensively about the intersection of technology, diversity, and creative industries.
Kulesz’s essay explores what he calls the Creative Economy 4.0, which he defines as a new cultural landscape where algorithms and data-driven systems shape how creative goods are produced and circulated. He warns that the same technologies that enable innovation can also consolidate power in a handful of dominant platforms. Yet, he remains optimistic: AI can be a democratizing force if small and mid-sized organizations are given fair access to digital infrastructure.
His vision calls for policy frameworks that promote open, inclusive innovation ecosystems. For museums, this translates into adopting adaptable and affordable technologies that support creativity and participation rather than dependency.
4. Ojoma Ochai – “Equity and Access Are the Cornerstones of Cultural Rights”
Ojoma Ochai is Managing Director of CcHUB, Africa’s largest innovation center, and a co-founder of its Creative Economy Practice. She also serves on UNESCO’s Global Reference Group on Cultural Diversity in the Digital Environment and co-chairs the Microsoft and UNDP Reference Group on AI for Development.
Ochai’s contribution anchors a recent UNESCO report on the realities of global inequality. She argues that cultural rights in the 21st century must include digital rights, which are the ability to access, understand, and shape technology. Many communities still lack the infrastructure or training to participate meaningfully in the digital transformation of culture.
Her call to action centers on equity: open access to AI resources, investment in digital literacy, and international collaboration to close the technological gap. For museums, this principle expands the role of cultural institutions beyond exhibition and preservation. They become agents of empowerment, ensuring that everyone, regardless of geography or resources, can participate in the cultural future.
5. Roman Lipski – “The Augmented Artist as a New Creative Paradigm”
Roman Lipski is a Polish-German painter based in Berlin, known for his experimental use of technology in art. His projects Artificial Muse and Quantum Blur (developed with IBM Research Zurich) explore how AI and quantum computing can transform creative practice. His work has been exhibited internationally, including at the Julia Stoschek Foundation, ZKM Karlsruhe, and the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.
Lipski speaks not as a policymaker but as a practitioner. His concept of the augmented artist reflects a philosophy of collaboration between human intuition and machine intelligence. AI, in his view, can act as a creative partner that challenges habits and introduces serendipity into the artistic process.
By integrating technology into his studio practice, Lipski demonstrates that digital tools can extend, rather than replace, human imagination. His example suggests a future where museums and cultural spaces serve as laboratories for co-creation; places where technology becomes a catalyst for artistic discovery and renewed cultural dialogue.
A Call for Cultural Resilience and Ethical Innovation;
The CULTAI report makes one thing clear: Rather than seeing AI as a technical element of business, it is much more comprehensive to see it as a cultural one.
It calls on governments, institutions, and innovators to:
Center cultural rights and diversity in AI policies.
Promote AI literacy through education and cultural programming.
Advance sustainability and low-carbon digital practices
Support ethical, transparent, and inclusive innovation.
We’re inspired to see these values reflected on a global stage — and that Brendan was able to bring Cuseum’s perspective to this important work. As AI continues to transform the cultural sector, we remain committed to ensuring that every innovation we build keeps culture, creativity, and people at its heart.