One of the aspects that first drew me to generative AI was its fluidity—its ability to traverse time, seamlessly connecting worlds and revealing the deep interconnectedness of everything. The algorithms I work with—GANs and diffusion models—are more than just mathematical constructs; they are multidimensional maps or 'latent spaces' of the sources we feed them, melting together history, culture, and form into something at once familiar and dreamlike.

What fascinates me about working with these deep-learning models is that we don’t fully understand what happens within the ‘black box’ where imagery emerges. This uncertainty places generative AI at an intersection of science, psychedelia, and dreams—a space where logic dissolves into alchemy, and where technology echoes the mystical. Like the scholars of a past era, who saw no contradiction between science and magic, I see these images as something both computational and transcendent, a glimpse into a parallel artistic reality that defies simple categorization.

But beyond the process itself, what truly matters is how we, as artists and observers, integrate these synthetic visions into our cultural memory. Every artistic revolution—whether the camera obscura of the Renaissance, the invention of photography, or the digital turn of the late 20th century—has forced a reconsideration of authorship, originality, and meaning. AI is simply the next chapter in this ongoing transformation.

It is tempting to think of AI as an alien force, something separate from human expression. But the reality is that these models are reflections of us—our history, our aesthetics, our biases, our contradictions. They are not independent creators but complex instruments, extending human perception in ways we are only beginning to grasp. When we delegate part of the creative process to an algorithm, the result is not the erasure of human intent, but a new way of seeing—an altered, augmented mode of visual thinking that challenges our assumptions about authorship and the act of making itself.

The challenge ahead is not whether AI should be used in art, but how we will shape its role. Will we resist it out of fear, or will we embrace its potential while maintaining the critical, poetic, and disruptive spirit that defines artistic practice? The medium is new, but the questions are ancient. And just as art has always found ways to absorb and subvert technology, this moment is no different. AI does not diminish the role of the artist—it amplifies the possibilities of what an artist can be.

artist: Bas Uterwijk (@ganbrood) | medium: PNG, 3000x3840 pixels | original creation date: March 10, 2022
This single edition NFT is accompanied with a 28x36cm print on 308gsm Hahnemulle Photorag Cottonwhite paper

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