Inside 'The Next Rembrandt': How JWT Got a Computer to Paint Like the Old Master

The project leaders explain their brilliant, troubling masterpiece

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CANNES, France—Rembrandt van Rijn finished his last painting in 1669, the year he died. So it was enthralling, and a little unsettling, to step on to a boat at the Cannes Lions festival for a private viewing of the first new Rembrandt in 347 years.

In a fascinating merging of creativity and technology, the humans at J. Walter Thompson Amsterdam taught a computer to paint like Rembrandt by having it study the old master's works for months.

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