Five prominent artists working at the intersection of technology and contemporary art have come together to explore what they term "post-AI art" in a groundbreaking collaborative discussion. Avery Singer, Simon Denny, Holly Herndon, Mat Dryhurst, and Jon Rafman engaged in conversations across multiple platforms including X Chat, WhatsApp, and Zoom to examine where art might be heading in the post-artificial intelligence era.
The discussion, published in ArtReview, represents a unique attempt to define an emerging artistic movement that goes beyond traditional AI art categories. Singer initiated the conversation by expressing frustration with the lack of convincing frameworks for new technology-engaged art since around 2008. She argued that artists themselves should be actively involved in announcing and defining new artistic movements, rather than having their work primarily framed in relation to their supposed identities.
The participants drew parallels to historical art movements, particularly referencing the 2013 exhibition "Speculations on Anonymous Materials" curated by Susanne Pfeffer at the Fridericianum in Kassel, which was significant for post-internet art. Denny connected their current work to Italian Futurism methodologies, noting that technologist influencers developing AI are actively evoking Futurism. He described his own AI-generated compositions that combine Futurist paintings with contemporary AI defense-tech company advertising images, created using plotters to produce what he calls "robot-produced fake Futurist paintings."
The artists addressed the complex politics surrounding AI and copyright issues. Rafman pointed out the contradiction where copyleft advocates, who originally resisted copyright, are now leaning on copyright frameworks for "ethical AI." Dryhurst and Herndon revealed their position of building an opt-out protocol that essentially turns all world data into public domain by default, allowing individuals to opt out if they choose. This approach aims to nudge the entire intellectual property system toward reform.
A central theme emerged around the concept of "protocols" rather than traditional art objects. Dryhurst argued that the most consequential creative decisions in the world over the past 15 years have been made by people who wouldn't traditionally be considered artists. The group emphasized that the real value lies in creating systems and protocols rather than individual outputs, addressing concerns about AI's ability to generate unlimited content.
The discussion culminated in an experimental approach using Google's NotebookLM, which combines uploaded texts using what's known in AI terms as a "context window." This tool allowed them to merge their various texts and references into collaborative outputs, including generated texts, music, and video content. The resulting experimental outputs blend coherence with nonsense, derivative elements with innovation, creating what they describe as manifestations of a paradigm that may be reaching its peak.
Singer proposed the alternative term "neural media" instead of "post-AI," suggesting dynamic, generative content where readers can continuously create unique material. The group explored the concept of working within "context windows" - a term borrowed from machine learning referring to the amount of information a large language model can hold in memory at once. They viewed this as a more contemporary approach than traditional manifestos.
The artists acknowledged the visceral reactions that AI art provokes, which differs significantly from responses to earlier tools like CGI or Photoshop. Rafman emphasized that AI itself isn't unethical - it's simply a tool - but the real ethical problems arise from licensing structures that favor large media corporations with extensive IP archives while shutting out independent creators.
Their collaborative experiment produced three AI-generated outputs: a dystopian text titled "BEGIN TRANSMISSION: CONTEXT WINDOW ADVISORY" that reads like a technical manual from a post-human future, a pop song created by Rafman called "Neural Nets Consuming Me," and a deepfake video using transcribed text from a venture capitalist. These outputs simultaneously demonstrate the potential and the unsettling nature of AI-generated content.
The discussion reveals artists grappling with fundamental questions about creativity, authorship, and value in an age of algorithmic generation. They argue that as AI transforms image-making as radically as the internet and photography did before it, artists must actively participate in defining the emerging landscape rather than being passive subjects of technological change. Their work suggests that the future of art may lie not in individual objects but in the design of systems, protocols, and experiences that enable others to create.
