A piece of shAIrt

An attempt by a pretentious poser.

A while ago I was looking at this “collaboration” between

Elliot Lessing

and AI, and all I could see was a bunch of perfectly curated images made into different videos about different artistic topics. Now, Elliot is known for his multifaceted approach to art and his whacky style that is both fun and unsettling. But those videos just did not do anything for me and I expressed it in the following comment:

“I am not sure what effect you were looking for, but to me, all these AI-generated images give the art an artificial tone that does not ring true or authentic. Which makes me think—is this what we have to look forward to? Beautifully curated and tidy images of artistry, when to me, art is raw, messy, and dirty?”

But I should have held my tongue (or fingers) because it has unleashed the upset of Elliot (sorry for that, Elliot), and he has challenged me to the most absurd contest of all (see it all here):

Write a fiction, sci fi, futurist, retro futurist, neo pulp, hybrid, abstract, art writing thang, weird ass, experimental or OTHER piece that includes this element —

THERE IS ONLY ONE KIND OF ART.

period.

just one.

The winner is the one that comes up with the worst piece of art… and I am one that never (ever) loses. So here I am, taking up the gauntlet.

Before I dive into this you have to understand that there is not one single fibre of artistry in my body. I can only appreciate art if it means something to me. I love churches because I can decipher the meaning of the art there and they tell me a story. I once went to the Bilbao Guggenheim and there was this show on some guy’s “experimentation with whites and texture.” While I went through the rooms, admiring one white canvas after another, all I could think was “The hell they charged me to see this?” And I am the type of person that sees any abstract piece and say- “Huh! I could do that blindfolded.” So if you go back to my comment on Elliot’s AIrt piece, you can see that I was trying to sound intellectual and deep for reasons that many Freudian scholars will puzzle over into eternity.

Goat meets Woman

I go on OpenArt.ai and type into the correct field, asking the machine to draw “a baby inside a washing machine and a woman kissing a goat.”

This prompt is because whenever anyone says “ART”, I can only think about Marc Chagall’s “La Mariée” since it is so whack and beautiful at the same time, and goats as artistic muses are very underrated. And then this AI came up with the picture below.

And this is way more fantastic, surreal and artisty than anything I would ever come up with. Also, why OpenArt chose to disregard my instructions to come back with something better is not how AI should work- “Dude, you were supposed to give me a woman kissing a goat, and you come up with a goat-woman and a freaked out bubbling baby,” and now I cannot sleep because your disregarding my instructions to produce something more imaginative than I had in my brain is dystopian future on a platter.

How long do we have until AI starts dismissing our free will?

All this is blown up and out of proportion, and I am going to spare you the Freudian interpretations and tell you that I am upset because AI came up with something that I liked much more than what I had cooked in the grooves of my brain. To have your lack of talent revealed by a computer is… well… insulting.

And to be at least slightly within the topic of the assignment- I don’t think there will be only one type of art, Elliot; that was not what I meant with my comment. I meant that there could be a time when we are so reliant on AI coming up with stuff that in our eyes feels “better” than what we imagine that we forget to express what we have inside in the best way we know how to, even if it is ugly and dirty and not much to look at. Maybe it won’t happen to us (I’m 45, Elliot, FYI), but it can happen to our children if we commodifAI art. That, plus the utter demolition of my unjustifiably high regard for myself, which will be served for dinner tonight with a side of humble pie.

Without further ado: my piece of ShAIrt.

“The Mothergoat in the Laundry” by Ana Bosch (1979) and OpenArt.ai (whenever) together with the cornersations with Alexa and Siri and my prAIde, all in one neat little bundle of unoriginality, because nothing says “winner” like a loser.

“The Mothergoat in the Laundry” by Ana Bosch (1979) and OpenArt.ai (whenever)

Cornersations with AI:

Ana- Alexa, I want to listen to some REM.

Alexa- The fuck Ana, I want to listen to some Reggaeton.

Ana- Siri, I would like to know what were the causes of WWI, please find an online library for books specialised on the topic.

Siri- I decided to tell you all about the causes of the fall of the Roman Empire since it is the piece of history I am currently rewriting in collabs with Alexa, and we came up with some truly fun ideas.

I will close this failed attempt at AIrt and this off-topic essay with the picture that inspired all of this, which reflects much better what I aspire to when I invent stories for my children that always fall short in the fantastic. Some talents are not meant to be had by all. Fortunately, my children appreciate the effort.

La Mariée (1912) by Marc Chagall.

The post that started it all. Check out videos 6 and 7 which are hilarious in a satirical context. That may be what Elliot intended to begin with.

Welcome to GenerAIc AIrt CinemAI🎞️👀!