AI in Service of Art, Learning, and Accessibility
Our Approach to Artificial Intelligence
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is impacting how people create, learn, communicate, and access information. While these technologies raise important questions and concerns, the CMA believes cultural institutions have a responsibility to engage thoughtfully with AI rather than ignore it. Our goal is to help shape how AI is used in ways that expand access to art, support the work of museum professionals, and uphold the rights and contributions of artists and creators, while honoring the creativity, scholarship, and lived experience that define the museum. AI is not a replacement for human expertise; rather, it is one of many technologies we use in the service of art, audiences, and learning.
The following descriptions explain how and why the museum uses AI, the principles that guide its deployment, and the safeguards we put in place to protect artists, visitors, and our community.
How the CMA Uses AI
The CMA views AI as a tool that can empower staff to focus their talent where it can make the biggest impact. By supporting tasks ranging from research, analysis, and content development to accessibility, discovery, and other operational functions, AI can help create more capacity for creativity, scholarship, strategic thinking, collaboration, and meaningful engagement with audiences—areas where human expertise, creativity, and judgement remain irreplaceable. The CMA explores and applies AI in carefully defined ways that support our public mission, including:
- Improving access to collections through discovery tools, multilingual support, and assistive technologies that help more people engage with art. In spring of 2026, we enhanced accessibility to the CMA's Collection Online with the addition of AI-generated visual descriptions for every object in the collection. The translation of our artworks’ key visual elements into these descriptions provides visitors who are blind or have low vision increased access to experience and engage with each work.
- Enhancing interpretation and learning, such as experimental interfaces that help visitors ask new kinds of questions about artworks or explore connections across cultures and time periods. Introduced during the COVID-19 pandemic, ArtLens AI: Share Your View enables community members to connect with art in new ways using their own images by matching shapes, patterns, and objects to collection pieces with similar characteristics.
- Supporting museum operations in low‑risk, efficiency‑focused areas, always with human oversight. For example, during the winter 2025 exhibition, Renaissance to Runway: The Enduring Italian Houses, artists specializing in using AI as their medium brought to life rare garments that are otherwise too delicate to wear, leveraging environmentally sustainable computing resources housed on-site.
- The CMA endeavors to use AI to invite curiosity and create new pathways into the collection, while preserving the human elements at the center of the museum experience.
Making Art Accessible to All
Exploration and Experimentation
As part of our role as a research and educational institution, the CMA supports limited, carefully controlled experimentation with emerging AI technologies. Exploratory projects are designed for learning and evaluation, do not rely on sensitive data, and are not deployed publicly without human review and approval.
This approach allows the museum to better understand new tools, ask critical questions, and contribute to broader conversations about technology and culture.
AI Collection Tool Sets
Human Review Principles
All AI‑assisted work at the CMA is guided, reviewed, and approved by museum staff. Curators, educators, conservators, technologists, and researchers remain accountable for the accuracy, tone, and intent of all public‑facing content.
AI may assist with research, drafting, organization, or experimentation, but final decisions, especially those presented to visitors, are made by people.
Transparency with Our Audiences
The CMA is committed to being open about when AI is used for generating content that is displayed publicly. Any content displayed to the public that is generated or materially modified using AI, is clearly labeled accordingly.
We believe transparency builds trust and helps contextualize for visitors how AI enhances, without significantly changing, the visitor experience.
Ethical and Responsible Use
As a cultural leader, the CMA believes audiences expect museums not only to adopt new technologies thoughtfully, but also to help establish standards that protect artists, respect intellectual property, and preserve the value of human creativity. Our use of AI is governed by an internal institutional policy that emphasizes:
- Alignment with the CMA’s mission and values
- Respect for artists, cultures, and intellectual property
- Avoidance of harmful bias or misrepresentation
- Human review for all public‑facing outputs
- Clear accountability for decisions influenced by AI
The CMA does not allow AI systems to make unsupervised decisions that affect individuals and we actively test and evaluate systems to mitigate bias and unintended consequences. We view AI to be a tool that must be wielded responsibly, which can be used creatively, but must not diminish artistic authenticity.
We view AI to be a tool that must be wielded responsibly, which can be used creatively, but must not diminish artistic authenticity.
ArtLens Reimagined: The Intersection of Art, Technology, and Innovation
Protecting Data, Rights, and Privacy
CMA takes data protection seriously. We do not share confidential, proprietary, or sensitive information with public AI tools, and we carefully evaluate vendors and systems before approving AI technologies for use.
Images of artworks and other copyrighted materials are handled with particular care, and AI systems are not permitted to retain or train on protected content.
Looking Forward
AI is a rapidly evolving field, and the CMA’s approach continues to adapt as technologies, standards, and public expectations change. We believe museums have a responsibility not only to adapt to emerging technologies, but to help shape how they are used ethically, creatively, and in service of the public. We see this work as an ongoing dialogue, internally among staff and externally with artists, scholars, peers, and the public.
By using AI deliberately, transparently, and responsibly, the Cleveland Museum of Art aims to expand access to its collection while remaining firmly committed to artists, scholarship, audience trust, and the art and culture that museums exist to celebrate.