Jennifer Perkin – Author’s Response

I was struck by how stark and lonely and moody the first images are and how quickly they evolve into something much warmer and optimistic.

I thought the prompt would produce something more robotic, industrial, maybe a kind of man versus machine motif. What it produced however was more abstract, even a bit poetic?

I feel it actually infuses philosophical themes of solipsism, in that the latter images riff on a sort of ‘world in the mind’ idea. How do I know if this is real? The images suggest that we don’t. The external world potentially doesn’t exist outside of the mind. Which raises the question – if that were the case, would that make it any less ‘real’?

The feeling it leaves me with is both warmth … and a little bit unsettled.

Aesthetically to me the last four images are a touch sci-fi or even pseudo new-age, especially the latter images with their slightly peculiar white outfits. They remind me of retro-futurism, almost what I would expect from AI in a way.

The first person who appears in the series feels closer to nature, with the naked torso and wild hair, and then they get progressively more ‘civilised’ and generic as the image in the mind become more detailed.

The feeling it leaves me with is both warmth … and a little bit unsettled.

Does it know something I don’t?

JP 15-06-2023