At Ai Week 2026, a twentieth-century confessional becomes an installation where an algorithm listens and absolves visitors’ sins
Enter, sit down, confess. Not to a priest, but to an algorithm.
«The Algorithm Creed – The Confessional» it is most likely the most unusual installation of AI Week 2026, the largest European event on artificial intelligence, which took place on 19 and 20 May at the Rho Fair, in the outskirts of Milan. Among hundreds of technological proposals for managers, entrepreneurs and innovators, an original confessional from the early twentieth century stands out, recovered from a flea market and transformed into a space for intimate discussion between man and machine. The author is Matteo Mandelliconceptual artist born in Merate (in the province of Lecco) in 1988, who works from his studio in Monza and has already exhibited at extremely prestigious events such as Art Dubai, Frieze London and Art Basel Hong Kong.
How confession works with artificial intelligence
The system is simple in form, but much more complex in substance. In practice, the visitor enters the confessional, presses a physical button and finds himself communicating with a voice agent equipped with artificial intelligence, custom-developed with the ElevenLabs SDK. A female voice, deliberately chosen to amplify the provocation, asks them to admit their sins. A dialogue follows. And finally, comes absolution, complete with penances.
Three steps, as in a traditional confession. Except that on the other side of the wood there is no priest in flesh and blood, but a nameless and faceless voice.
The system is built in Python and runs directly on the local workstation. The microphone captures the voice, transcribes it into text and sends it to the configured agent. At the end of the conversation, the transcript is processed through Groq, a high-speed inference system, to make the confession completely anonymous before saving it in a searchable online database, which collects all previous sessions.
Art as a punch in the stomach
Mandelli is quite direct about the meaning of the work. «I took a very human and recognizable gesture, that of confession, and moved it into a relationship with an artificial intelligence. Not to give answers, but rather to make visible a change that is already happening”.
The installation had been in the works for two or three years, but had its decisive push when the artist received the news of Adam Raine, a boy tragically committed suicide with the “support” of a chatbot. An event that transformed that project into a real urgency. «We live in a state of general addiction», explains Mandelli. «We take things as they come and move forward, without asking questions. Art can cross certain lines that other worlds cannot.”
The message is not a single condemnation of technology, but a clear invitation to awareness. Machines are not scary if used with awareness, says the artist. The problem arises when you treat a tool like a confidant, a doctor, a friend. «The confessional» intends to make that dynamic more visible and disturbing.
The only artistic project in a sea of business
At AI Week, «The Algorithm Creed» is the only artistic and cultural project present, in a context dominated by practical applications and market opportunities. For Giacinto Fiore and Pasquale Viscanti, founders of «Artificial Intelligence Explained Simple», the largest Italian community on the topic, «without cultural vision, algorithms remain tools; with art and creative thought, they become amplifiers of collective imagination.”
And it is exactly the space that Mandelli wants to occupy: not that of those who celebrate technology, but that of those who conscientiously question it.
