The Dalí Museum has a long-standing tradition of merging art with technology—from VR to deepfake. With the constant evolution of AI capabilities, we saw the opportunity to utilize AI to create an experience that is not only innovative but also provides a unique way to interact with the brilliant mind of Salvador Dalí.

So in order to celebrate the 120th anniversary of Salvador Dalí's birth, we were tasked with creating a unique and groundbreaking experience for the Dalí Museum. Our goal was to connect one of the greatest artists of the last century with an audience increasingly focused on the present and its emerging technologies.

Since Dalí passed away in 1989, we can only speculate about what he would say about his art, his inspiration or even his life in general. So we asked ourselves, What if we used cutting-edge technology to tap into one of the most brilliant minds of all time?

Using a combination of different AI platforms—including GPT-4 Turbo from OpenAI and Multilingual V2 from ElevenLabs—trained on Dalí’s works, texts and interviews, we were able to re-create not only Dalí's voice but also his style and personality. We’ve packaged all this high-end technology into something extremely lo-fi: a rotary phone that’s a recreation of Dalí’s iconic Lobster Phone.

As museum patrons approach the Ask Dalí installation, they are invited to pick up the Lobster Phone and engage in conversation with the surrealist genius. Salvador Dalí will answer their questions in real time, as if the artist had been brought back to life.

Recent trends have shown a decline in art museum attendance among younger Americans, who often view traditional museums as outdated and unengaging. In response, we aimed to reconnect one of the last century's most innovative artists, Salvador Dalí, with an audience increasingly focused on the future.

But how can we show them that Dalí is anything but outdated and unengaging? By giving our audience the opportunity to speak with him directly.

That’s why we developed "Ask Dalí"—an interactive experience that utilizes artificial intelligence to 'revive' Salvador Dalí. This allows visitors, particularly from younger demographics, to interact with a digital reincarnation of Dalí, engaging in real-time conversations via his iconic Lobster Phone. An initiative that not only celebrates Dalí’s inventive spirit but also bridges the gap between traditional art appreciation and the digital expectations of today’s youth.

“Ask Dalí" is powered by several modern machine-learning models, including GPT-4 Turbo from OpenAI and Eleven Multilingual V2 from ElevenLabs. The models have been trained using a variety of the artist’s writings and archival audio of Salvador Dalí giving interviews in English. The result is a voice that sounds remarkably like Dalí's real voice and a dialogue that reflects his unique personality, style and humor.

The key to making this experience happen was our beta testing of the foundational ML model Eleven Multilingual V2 from ElevenLabs. Our testing found that not only could this model create a very convincing clone of the voice of Salvador Dalí, it was also fast enough to enable a conversation in real-time between the museum visitors and Dalí. The model was released in September 2023, and this is when we started developing the idea.

The project was revealed at SXSW in March 2024, where we took questions from the audience, and a prototype of Salvador Dalí responded in real-time. Based on our learnings from this prototype we refined the experience, finished building a faithful reconstruction of Dalí’s Lobster Telephone, and opened up for questions when the project launched at the Dalí Museum in April 2024.

"Ask Dalí" made its debut at SXSW, becoming one of the event's most anticipated panels called “AI and the future of creativity”. It was an instant success, drawing long queues of audience members eager to talk with the surrealist genius.

Though the experience launched at the museum on April 11, it made a huge impact, with over 500 million PR impressions in only one week. "Ask Dalí" continues to garner global attention, making headlines across the Americas, Europe, and Asia, and being featured in major news publications such as Fox News, Forbes, INC., NPR, and Smithsonian Magazine. Our digital replica of Salvador Dalí has participated in numerous interviews, including even a podcast.

In the week following the launch, the museum saw a significant surge in ticket sales, with "Ask Dalí" attracting long lines of patrons eager to interact with the digital "Salvador Dalí."