“AI” Graphics: Art for Art’s Sake?
AUTHOR’S NOTE: Warning!!! Curmudgeon alert! Computer-generated “AI” artwork is a thing right now that has caused considerable buzz in the online tarot community. We might well ask (along with Barry Mann back in 1961) “Who put the bomp in the bomp bah bomp bah bomp?” I would argue that the creative “bomp” is being hijacked by computer science and may never resurface in purely human form. Another pertinent musical reference is the 10cc song “Art for Art’s Sake.” Rather than successfully advancing the premise that art can interpret life in vivid new ways, it seems to be art replicating itself, a tired “clone of a clone” with delusions of grandeur. From what I’ve seen so far, it’s not all bad but it has more misses than hits. I’m afraid I can’t climb aboard the “Love Boat” on this one.
Appreciation of tarot imagery is largely a matter of entrenched personal preference for me, akin to my taste in fine art (Post-Impressionism); liquor (peated scotch and mezcal); literature (epic fantasy); poetry (lyrical Romanticism); humor (Monty Python and Mel Brooks); and music (Chicago blues and its step-child, blues-rock). The only imperatives are that it be deep in symbolism and executed in a profoundly mystical style whatever its aesthetic inspiration. Charming, idyllic expressions (animals, butterflies, fairies and such) and minimalist or abstract figures, typically without intellectual “hooks,” don’t interest me at all in a tarot deck. I often experience two unkind reactions if I negligently buy one of these: “Oh, look, another pack of ‘Why bother!’” and “What was I thinking?” In the past I’ve dismissed them as “TINOs” (tarot in name only).
Which brings me to the subject of AI-generated tarot artwork, in which the practitioner inputs descriptive verbiage to a computer and the “artificial intelligence” (sounds suspiciously like an oxymoron) spits out a picture based on its library of “inferences” (visual associations) for the conceptual text entered. Unless someone has programmed the computer with a wealth of symbolically-relevant linked keywords and iconic images, the result is likely to be intellectually “neutered” whimsy, by which I mean it may be visually pleasing and emotionally evocative but not fundamentally aligned with what normally passes for “deep thought” in tarot practice (come to think of it, the same criticism might be leveled at “art decks” like the Wild Unknown). It strikes me as a crutch for non-artists who want to see their ideas rendered in pictorial form. It’s intriguing but doesn’t seem particularly legitimate from an “applied talent” perspective, even if the practitioner (I won’t yet say “digital artist”) is able to tweak the results with more precise input (or with pixel-editing software).
I can envision having a conversation with my PC: “There is a thin man in the foreground . . . wait, not that thin! C’mon, get with the program, this is the grossly overfed 21st Century! Who programmed this thing anyway?” I’m trying to be funny but the subject is a serious one, like genetically modified organisms: just because we can do something doesn’t necessarily mean we should. Based on present evidence, I really miss the orphic wisdom that can be derived from a robust and sophisticated metaphysical viewpoint. The conjured images may be elegant but they often seem oddly hollow and devoid of philosophical depth. (Someone needs to create a Crowley/Harris-inspired supercomputer named “Deep Thoth.”)
Tarot culture has most likely been prepped for this development by the release of mindlessly beautiful cards that can’t be “read” in any conventional sense without resorting to some seriously convoluted free-association. I simply don’t want to buy decks that make me work that hard, especially if I’m going to wind up reading them like loosely impressionistic oracles anyway. While the form may impress me with its beauty, the functionality doesn’t offer much that’s compelling in the way of tarot. Let’s just say I’m reserving judgment until I see something truly eye-opening that is more than sumptuous eye-candy.
Originally published at http://parsifalswheeldivination.wordpress.com on October 22, 2022.
