Kimberly Lyle, an assistant professor of sculpture and technology at the University of Georgia’s Lamar Dodd School of Art, is creating interactive artworks that encourage audience participation through sound and touch. “Many times, we ask art audiences to engage with work visually,” Lyle said. “I work with sound and touch; there’s an emotional and embodied aspect to it. I have artworks that invite participants to make rubbings on a table, breathe into a machine or enter a word into a sculpture.”
Lyle was recently recognized with the 2025 Innovation in AI Teaching Award at UGA. Her background, influenced by her parents’ careers as educators in language and computers, shapes her approach to teaching about artificial intelligence (AI) and large language models (LLMs). She encourages students to consider how these technologies are developed, what values influence them, and how biases can arise. “There is no neutral technology, and AI is the same,” Lyle said.
She points out that many AI voice assistants rely on datasets based on Western European speech patterns, which can disadvantage other linguistic traditions. This observation draws from historical developments such as Wolfgang von Kempelen’s speaking machine from the 18th century.
In one of Lyle’s courses, student Violet Lustiano explored AI’s role in art by comparing traditional painting methods with those generated or guided by ChatGPT. Lustiano created three paintings—one by hand outdoors at the UGA Latin American Ethnobotanical Gardens, one digitally generated by ChatGPT based on her description, and one following step-by-step instructions from ChatGPT—and then asked classmates to identify each piece’s origin. The exercise sparked discussion about the limitations of machine interpretation when representing complex subjects like plants.
Lyle acknowledges the rapid pace of change in artificial intelligence and emphasizes ethical considerations related to data centers’ human and environmental impacts. “You can become overwhelmed trying to keep up,” she said. “I can use AI myself to see where holes exist and to find gaps. But I also have a growing awareness of the extractive human and environmental impact of data centers that power these systems and consider the ethics of using AI to question it.”
Hired under a presidential initiative aimed at expanding faculty research on artificial intelligence at UGA, Lyle has collaborated across disciplines through events organized by Franklin College research mixers led partly by Marni Shindelman from Lamar Dodd School of Art.
Recently, Lyle helped launch FLOW Lab: Facilitating Learning and Optimal Wellbeing Laboratory—a project funded by a Franklin College Multidisciplinary Seed Grant—alongside colleagues Mira Kallio-Tavin (art education), Dax Ovid (physiology/pharmacology), and Ari Schlesinger (computer science). The lab will serve neurodivergent students with sensory-responsive features designed collaboratively with students.
Lyle expressed appreciation for UGA’s inclusion of artists in conversations about artificial intelligence development: “I really appreciate that the university included voices from the arts as artists are rarely, if ever, sitting in the meetings where the tools actually get created,” she said. “A lot of times, they might be undervalued in spaces of technological development, and I think recognizing that role of questioning and imagining differently in the beginning and not necessarily as an afterthought is meaningful.”
She added humorously: “You know, the arts didn’t really ask for AI… But as artists, I believe it is our responsibility to engage with it critically, to disrupt its assumptions, and to imagine other ways we can be in relation to these systems — actively creating instead of passively consuming.” Lyle also noted: “I think a lot of these other disciplines are trying to use it in ways that are very pragmatic. It’s been great to see, to consider its usefulness and being a voice of questioning in my approach.”
Within her department, faculty members Ash Smith (photography/expanded media) and Annika Kappenstein (graphic design) also explore digital environments shaped by AI.
Despite deepening engagement with artificial intelligence among students, Lyle observes increased interest in hands-on experiences such as volunteering at gardens or working with physical materials—a contrast she describes as turning toward “natural intelligence.” She believes these embodied practices offer valuable counterpoints amid today’s screen-based culture.
Whether through woodworking or coding projects, Lyle aims for her teaching practice to inspire critical thinking about technology’s evolving role in society.
