ABOUT

The AIMAGINING project was a project-oriented investigation in 2022 of the AI process, engaging participants in the creative process of storying and GAN creation using the service provider, Snowpixel.app.

PROJECT WEBSITE

A site index was built to ensure ease of navigation of the project website hosted by Squarespace at https://www.aimagining.com

REGISTRATION

Participants were directed to an online registration page which provided them access to a secure online registration form to complete.

FACILITATION

Participants met with the Facilitator (me) on two (2) separate occasions via online web conferencing. Notes were made in Google document of that person’s storying and then excerpts were selected, generated, and processed using the Snowpixel online interface.

A strict process was followed to engage with participants to ensure their privacy and security of their personal information.

YOUR FACILITATOR

Dr. Alexander Hayes is a communication, information systems, and computing technologies professional, graduating with a Doctor of Philosophy through the Faculty of Engineering & Information Systems at the University of Wollongong, NSW Australia. He also has degrees in Visual, Performing, and Fine Arts (Honours) and Education (Early Childhood).

With a creative portfolio spanning 25 years in the visual, performing, and generative arts, Alexander engages across multiple domains and disciplines as a practicing professional artist, His research is focused on developing creative well-being industries engaging through storying as a social listening skill guided by ethical and cultural frameworks. He is also an avid entrepreneur, education technologies consultant, and creative industries researcher, describing himself as a champion of emancipatory human rights and social justice.

RESULTS - SHOWCASE

In sum total, six (6) people engaged with the AIMAGINING process, with a range of results shared with these people.

Participant 1 - Paul Carstairs

Paul Carstairs is an artist based in Western Australia. Carstairs is a co-founder of the AIMAGINING initiative involved in GAN research and development. Carstairs attended Edith Cowan University, Perth, Western Australia and graduated with a Post Graduate Diploma (Education), Murdoch University, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts (Film & Drama) and the Claremont School of Art graduating with a Diploma of Fine Arts. He has an extensive career as a professional artist, working across a wide range of mediums and genres and you can now view his AIMAGINING artworks as a collection in Opensea.

PARTICIPANT 2 - Marg O’Connell

Marg O’Connell is a community-based action researcher, education designer (M.Ed) and playworker living in Perth, Western Australia (Boorloo) on Whadjuk country. She is co-owner of Kindling Creative, a local enterprise that creates spaces for playful art and making. Marg works in mixed media, upcycling and reimagining materials as playable craft pieces and artworks.

“…I enjoyed the life storying process Alex offered as part of the AIMAGINING service. I was able to explore my story in a safe and enduring way, held beautifully by Alex, who is non-judgemental, present, and one of the best listeners I've met! Alex made sure I knew what to expect and guided me gently through the process to ensure I was able to get the most benefit out of it. Thank you!” Marg O’Connell - 14th April 2022

Participant 3 - Manon McDuffie

Manon McDuffie is accomplished generative artist working across a range of media, concepts and themes. She is graphic designer and is well known for her digital creative works in film making. Manon is an associate of the AIMAGINING group, and she is also known as ‘Metamorphose’ with her VQGAN+CLIP artworks.

Participant 4 - Alexander Hayes

Alexander Hayes is a renowned generative and traditional artist, researcher, entrepreneur and philanthropist. Hayes graduated with a Doctor of Philosophy, PhD. from the University of Wollongong, Sydney Australia in Computing and Information sciences, Curtin University, Perth with Honours (Fine Art) and Edith Cowan University, Bunbury with a Bachelor of Arts (Education). He is the founding Principal of AIMAGINING, principal partner with Oethica Group Productions, Perth, Western Australia and principal partner with the WICGAN Foundation.

NFT Marketplace - OpenSea

The NFT marketplace Opensea was selected as a provider to showcase the GAN creations from the AIMAGINING process.

LEXICON

This is the AIMAGINING dictionary, in which we describe the meaning of terms or words used across our website and services.

AFFIRMATION

Short, future facing statements of positive accord made by the Participant with the Facilitator, focussed on positivity and well being.

AI

Artificial Intelligence - intelligence demonstrated by machines, as opposed to the natural intelligence displayed by animals including humans - read more

 AIMAGINING

Generative art creation experiences (also known as AIART) meld humans storying, and artificial intelligence, in effect - Artificial Intelligence Art - read more

ACT

Acceptance Commitment Therapy - a form of psychotherapy, as well as a branch of clinical behaviour analysis, that invites people to open up to unpleasant feelings, learn not to overreact to them, and not avoid situations where they are invoked - read more

ANONYMISING

The process of removing details from the story for privacy and/or personal security reasons.

CONSULTATION

Meetings of between 90 and 120 minutes between the Facilitator and the Participant, conducted online via safe and secure, encrypted web conferencing facilities.

EXHIBITION

Participants select from the generated affirmation works, for exhibition as a collection on the AIMAGINING website.

FACT

Focussed and Acceptance Commitment Therapy - Short-term, solution-oriented therapy in an empirically based psychological intervention; using acceptance activity and mindfulness strategies along with commitment and behaviour-change strategies to increase psychological flexibility - read more

GENERATIVE ART

Generative art refers to creative works which are either whole or in part created with the use of an autonomous system or algorithm. In the context of AIMAGINING these artworks are generated from excerpts of text gathered during the human storying process - read more

LIFESTORY

The action of speaking out, recording, and generating alternate representations of a lived experience with the Facilitator.

MINDFULNESS

noun. the quality or state of being conscious or aware of something; and verb. focusing one's awareness on the present moment, acknowledging and accepting feelings, thoughts, and bodily sensations used in the FACT therapeutic technique.

PARTICIPANT

A person who has registered to engage in the storying and artwork generation process as part of the AIMAGINING consultation.

 POSITIVITY

The practice or tendency to be positive or optimistic in life ie. positive thinking, have positive emotions and engage with mindfulness in positive behaviours like kindness and generosity.

REGISTRATION

All participants must firstly register to engage in the AIMAGINING service generation of artworks through storying and artificial intelligence.

SCRIBING

The Facilitator makes notes which are visible with and while listening to the Participant, copied and made accessible to the Participant at the conclusion of the process.

STORYING

noun. The action of the participant telling / sharing a story or stories; and verb. the process of describing one's life story.

VQGAN + CLIP

Vector Quantized Generative Adversarial Network (VQGAN) and Contrastive Language-Image Pretraining (CLIP) algorithms - read more