009 - Challenging Technology Trajectories – A presentation for Comics and AI conference
Last week, I had the pleasure of being invited to Comics and AI, a one-day multidisciplinary conference on the future of comics, technology, and creativity.
This was at City St George’s University of London, and took place just a few weeks before the launch of my 2 new Eliza publications.
I won’t be putting up the whole presentation here (you either had to be there, or you have to get the upcoming publication that collects the papers and the presentations), but here are some excerpts from my presentation:
The State of Affairs today
To kick off (as with any speculative design work) I started with a collection of signals evidenced through news articles and some of my own conclusions drawn to sense-make the moment we are in today.
I spoke about how big-tech bosses love to tout Gen-AI as inevitable, and how that feels deterministic to me.
I followed up with evidence for how GenAI, for all it’s transformational narrative, is very often being applied in very mundane or even strange ways – like summaries of user reviews on Amazon; or Tinder’s “The Game Game”.
All this, while there is mounting evidence of GenAI outputs leading to misinformation, absurd social situations, and the sheer climate irresponsibility in training and using these products.
In conclusion,
‘AI’ inevitability is also the inevitability of dire climate conditions, absurd digital interactions, and indistinguishable misinformation.
So… what can Eliza - The Ghost in Every Machine, a speculative fiction and design graphic novel project, do?
Critiquing Status Quo
The very first format that I presented Eliza in was that of New Yorker style cartoons with a single image and a caption. These were meant to be responses to contemporary technology happenings. This gives the cartoons a critical point of view wrapped in playful nature.
Personifying (if I may call it a ‘person’ at all) computer logic / algorithms / programmes as Eliza allowed me to hold up a mirror to our socio-technological today, to raise questions around human agency, and the omnipresent role of technology in our lives today.
These cartoons, originally drawn between 2021-23 are now collected in a definitive volume, “The Complete Cartoon Collection”, that will be available in October 2025.
When I finished the 120 cartoons in 2023, I thought it wasn’t enough to only critique the status quo, and that I should use the Eliza as a means to imagine better alternatives - something science and speculative fiction (or fiction in general) has been wonderful at since the earliest times.
The project then pivoted into being Speculative Fiction anthology with short stories all featuring Eliza. The first bunch of these stories have now become “Imagine with Eliza”, a 32 page comic.
Imagining (Better?) Alternatives
In my latest stories, I’ve intentionally tried to imagine alternatives to how technology has permeated our own society. For example, ‘The Solar Dominion’ is an exploration of the ‘Solarpunk’ genre and takes place in a world where technology hasn’t come at the cost of the planet. Furthermore, it details out relationships between humans and machines in this decidedly utopian world.
What was also on my mind while writing and drawing ‘The Solar Dominion’ was the fact that most science fiction explorations of the future are dystopian; adding to a same-y future with neon lights rife with inquality and AI. This story was a means to challenge myself to see what a utopian arrangement of technology and society looks like, and what might the lived experience of that be.
I’d seen Kevin Huizenga, one of my favourite comic artists, do readings of his comics as he reveals them panel by panel, and this was my chance to do the same.
Next, I also read out a couple of pages from ‘Instruction Manuals for Human-Machine Harmony’, which is also a part of the ‘Imagine with Eliza’ anthology.
In conclusion
“The very act of trying to look ahead to discern possibilities and offer warnings is in itself an act of hope.” – Octavia Butler
To conclude, I detailed three modes of approaching AI while making comics: resistance, collaboration, and indifference.
There was so much to speak here, and I’ve chosen these three points to conclude this post:
I’ve got a stamp that explicitly calls out that Eliza has been written and drawn by hand (shown in the image above). This shall be on the back cover of all the publications.
For me, inspiration to write comics from podcasts, speaking with friends, going to see exhibits, and so much more! Just asking a chatbot is a far inferior way to get to ideas. I carry a pocket notebook with me everywhere to write / draw ideas down.
Technology is incidental to making comics, and not the reason I make them. One of the first instances of ‘sequential art’ or comics can be cave paintings where cave-people drew chronological sequences of hunting. My desire to tell stories isn’t dependent on AI. (Reminds me of Chris Ware’s art as shown below!)
By Chris Ware, for Acme Novelty Library
By Chris Ware, for Acme Novelty Library
By Chris Ware, for Acme Novelty Library
The event brought forward different perspectives, and the other speakers (listed here) all offered so many ways to make sense of the moment we are in. Maybe I’ll write another post about what I picked from other speakers soon.
Until the next one!
– V.
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