Over the last week, I have spent many a late night playing with AI image generation on Midjourney with what can only be described as frenzied compulsion. Since my friend Winston showed me that you can set up an account on Discord, join a chatroom called Newbies, and type the phrase /imagine…to have a machine spit out a visual of whatever you imagine in less than a minute…I’ve been amazed, amused, addicted, impressed, and inspired beyond all measure.
Incidentally, the last time I remember feeling this way was exactly a decade ago, when I was sitting in the incredible bookstore Arcana in Los Angeles…and beginning to vaguely form in my mind what is today known as The Letterist. The wave of ideas and possibilities and imaginations of everything I could and would create was intoxicating. I’ve longed for that feeling ever since, and I never imagined something called Artificial Intelligence would turn out to be what did it for me.
But let’s back up a bit, because a little over a week ago I had no solid understanding of what AI even was. I had heard of ChatGPT and once played with it for a few minutes, I had felt the buzz in the media that seemed to be a cocktail of enthusiasm and fear, and I had the vague sense that anyone serious in the design industry was dismissive of it, so I sort of bashfully followed suit. How can a machine ever possibly recreate the unique constellation of talent, know-how, experience, process, heart and soul that so many of us proudly and painstakingly pour into our work? And how dare anyone suggest that it could? They must not get it. My aaaaarrrrttttt!!! My suffffffffering! My very beiiiinnngggg!
At the core of this whole AI conversation, our big and fragile creative egos are necessarily wounded. Strip away the job and economic implications, the sci-fi over-exaggerations, the die-hard nostalgia, and the fear of the unknown…and I believe what we’re all hearing is this: A machine can do what you do. You’re not special. You’re not unique. You’re not worthy. (And if it can’t do it yet, it will, very soon).
But after playing with it for only a few days, and getting a better and first-hand understanding of both its capabilities and limitations, I am decidedly feeling quite the opposite. Fear is replaced by awe, doubt is replaced with boundless enthusiasm, and while I can’t say I’m feeling more assured in my “uniqueness” - I am definitely more moved, in a very visceral way, to dive deep into understanding precisely what my uniqueness, or uniqueness itself might actually consist of.
Clients may ask you to imagine a dress or a sofa or a house or a poster…and you on your own may imagine works and projects and products and services you might one day like to create or offer. But when faced with a machine that is simply and effortlessly offering you the service of rendering anything at all you might imagine in under sixty seconds….what on earth or in outer space would it actually be?
I’ve fallen utterly in love with the limitlessness of this question. I have only dabbled and scratched the surface of beginning to find the answers. Turns out a two-headed swan at a disco is one of them. There’s so much more I want to say about AI and specifically about Midjourney, but let me not get ahead of myself…it really only has been one week.
For now, I’ve decided to start a little visual sketchbook in the form of an Instagram account called beauty unfamiliar. I felt moved to create a space that would hold all the words and pictures that come to mind as I dive into my imagination, and begin to learn more about this tool that I really believe will significantly shape our future. Wander over and take a look. Write to me. Ask me questions. Share your thoughts and experiences. Let’s take this trip - and it really is a trip - together.
A.
PS. The name beauty unfamiliar is borrowed from the quote below by Thomas Mann. It is about solitude…but I felt it so accurately described the experience and images of my early forays in Midjourney. The handwriting on the picture above is mine. The prompt for this image was something like “a portrait of a woman holding an envelope in the style of Irving Penn.” I love Irving Penn. And I really love that AI added a turban of sorts that seems inspired by an envelope. Of course I also love that the envelope is black. I didn’t specify. It is this absurd and beautiful poetic license that I am most mesmerized by.
“Solitude gives birth to the original in us, to beauty unfamiliar and perilous - to poetry. But also, it gives birth to the opposite: to the perverse, the illicit, the absurd.”
PPS. Here is an actual photograph taken by the legendary Irving Penn for the also legendary Issey Miyake. I believe this may have been one of the images the machine was referencing. Magic. And REAL.
Let it be stated and restated, for the record, that AI has also only made me rediscover and fall more in love with real art. I cannot wait to have more conversations about what is and what isn’t REAL.
