Do We Find Art or Does Art Find Us?
Proactive Multimodal AI Art
The Fountainhead
Often in movies, you might see the character go to an art gallery, and the art they look at just happens to capture their exact state of emotion, ethical conflict, or lesson they needed to see at that time. It could also be some kind of stimulus which helps their subconscious resolve something which it has been wrestling with for days - whether the character realizes it or not.
I don’t know if it’s true, but I heard from a friend that a lot of rich people love to collect abstract art because they believe it reveals something about their subconscious mind, emotional state, and worldview … a reflection of their internal landscape.
I’ve also heard really successful people talk about how in their 20’s, in pursuit of their dreams, they were just mimicking inspiring characters they saw in a movie. With very little understanding of an industry and no clear role models, art was really all they had to base their identity on and muster up the courage to face entirely new kinds of trials and tribulations.
Stumbling into precisely relevant art isn’t just something that happens to characters in movies - it’s something that I’ve experienced firsthand. On one account, the day after a difficult breakup, I met up with a friend and before I could even share what had happened, he played an album for me which he was really excited about that day in his car. Keep in mind, this is an album I would have otherwise never heard of - which seriously helped me cope emotionally for the next year or so with what had happened. The album expressed a depth of emotions I didn’t even know were there inside me, and it provided the undertones to my life I desperately needed at that time as I went about my day. Was it serendipity? Or luck? Was the Universe looking out for me?
At other times, after wrestling with some kind of internal conflict - I don’t know if this has ever happened to you - but I would just recall the title of an obscure book or a movie I had never seen which was released years ago, which had themes or a character arc similar to a challenge I was dealing with at that time. It was as if my subconscious would just bubble up the relevant art from years ago, art which was well in my periphery in the past, that I had never consciously even thought about … but it just so happens that this art would provide the answers to what I was seeking at the time.
I even find myself revisiting certain art works too - just so I can experience them and once again glean the powerful moments of catharsis they had originally brought out of me. I can immediately recall them or the moments within them when I find myself in a familiar situation.
Even walking down the street, you are exposed to so many stimuli. How much of the great art that will shape you and impact you for the rest of your life is still out there and calling for you now? It seems to me, that you just need to be at the right frequency and it will suddenly reveal itself to you, once you are ready to receive it.
This is the now and art has been seeking you
You are reading this now and I realize my work has found you at a unique moment in your life. It has the opportunity to help you cope or process things that are going on with you. I’m not sure what you’re dealing with, but I will now share a few broader themes that are currently at the top of my mind - even if they are unrelated to the rest of the article - but maybe there is something of value to you here:
Stress Management
Lately, I have been working on my personal stress management. I’m at a point in my career where actually addressing the underlying fears and difficult interpersonal moments emotionally is the only way I will survive. Have you ever been woken up physically by your stress? Have you ever woken up, felt suddenly hot, then suddenly cold, and started shivering on your own even though nothing has happened and you are not in any kind of physical danger? I want you to know that high cortisol is a real thing and I’m hoping that it gets better for you like it appears to have for me.
Limerence
My friend has a crush on someone at his work and recently told me about this term called “Limerence”:
Limerence is an intense emotional state of infatuation, obsession, and deep longing for another person, often accompanied by intrusive thoughts, fantasies, and a desire for reciprocation
What I find fascinating about the whole thing is not that it can happen to someone, but that it can happen mutually to two people at the same time. How does such an intense magnetism just happen like that, to two individuals without even knowing anything about each other? Yes, pheromones exist or there could be other kinds of reasons, but to me, it seems like something which cannot be explained besides just that it was destiny and meant to be.
Feeling one’s feelings:
I wish schools taught us how to feel our own emotions and go through the meta process of what we call emotional processing. It comes very naturally to some people, but I would say for most people (like me), they either react strongly to emotions and over think for days on end, or they avoid these emotions altogether and let them drive their decisions and rule over them in all of these impulsive and unhealthy ways.
I have found that by holding my breath and paying attention to my heart beat, I am able to almost isolate out an emotion and usually feel it fizzle out, but I struggle with steps beyond that. For example, I struggle with labelling my emotions as they are happening or knowing truly where they came from. Other times, an emotion may be so strong and feel many times more outsized than me … even a taste of it is enough to scare me off to avoid it altogether. I’m still not sure what to do in that case.
An Opportunity: Proactive Multimodal AI Art
Instead of just relying on the mysterious gears of the universe, what if AI took on a more proactive role and went out of its way to connect you with relevant art, in the moments you need it the most?
In my 2022 video, GPT-X, Diffusion, and Our Multimodal Future, I proposed the idea of an AI chatbot which would automatically generate AI Art based on the events in your life and real challenges you’re going through:
In the above image (found also in the accompanying book I wrote for the video), the AI chatbot has generated something unique to describe the user’s emotional state after a car crash, keeping in mind their artistic influences, life experiences, and personal preferences. This is a typical example of what I call Proactive Multimodal AI art.
I will now attempt to classify different levels of potential Multimodal AI proactiveness:
Level 1: Recommendations
Keeping in mind your personal story and artistic preferences, at the first stage, AI would recommend existing movies, scenes from a show, songs, books, and other kinds of art which are interesting and strongly relate to the struggles you’re going through.
Level 2: Generating Custom Art
Similar to the example I gave above with the car crash, at level 2, the AI model would generate healing art, movies, music, or more to help you cope with any given moment in your life.
Based on what you could be going through, it could:
create art that automatically expresses the unique, deep pain you’re feeling
create art to help you cope with this feeling
provide abstract stimuli to help you solve difficult challenges or come to important realizations
automatically create media you can easily share with friends and benefit from as an artist
surprise and delight you with original creations which are highly relevant to you at that time to cherish forever
generate music, films, books, a biography of real people, and much more based on the exact struggle your going through
Level 3: Shaping your Perception through Custom Art
The real goal of art finding us through our own subconscious and subjective reality is to help us achieve moments of catharsis, cope with difficult emotions, overcome tough situations, understand different perspectives, and grow as people. At Level 3, through our already very detailed and psychologically revealing AI Chat history, the AI model would be capable of conceptualizing what’s top of mind for us now and find meaning in the early stages of our inquisitory chat messages.
With an understanding of what we might be going through and what’s possibly in our subconscious at that time, it could generate art or even continue engaging in simple conversations with us - but with very subtle thematic messaging - which overtime could guide us to the positive, growth outcomes we may be inherently seeking in our hearts.
I will skip the ethical questions raised here by AI having such strong influence over us, but I will ask what if AI is capable of seeing through our trauma or bad thought patterns to who we could be? What if it could work with us overtime and subtly shape us to the healthiest version of ourselves through the conversations we have and more importantly the media we consume?
On one hand, there is the serendipity of life and our subconscious and maybe that shouldn’t be meddled with, but on the other hand, what if we could accelerate this beautiful process more often? What if we could enhance the coping process and automatically create more art to help more people navigate their daily life and heal deep wounds? I personally believe the human demand for great, impactful art is unlimited. What other artistic life experiences are we missing out on right now because we aren’t being connected well enough?
I believe proactive Multimodal AI Art represents not just an exciting opportunity for Multimodal AI models but really a way for art to find us more often - this could be the next evolution of an existing magical part of life itself.