Jackson, D., 2023.

"What's an AI?" Planning for a future of ubiquitous generative AI in creative arts education

It is 2034. There is no AI in art and design. There is no AI. In fact, mention 'AI' to Gen A young people, and you might be met with a puzzled or embarrassed look, followed by a gentle reminder that no one calls it that these days. After all, this is 2034, where AI is as ubiquitous as the air you breathe. These students are the post-AI natives. To them, it would be like calling a photo, a video or a film 'digital' a decade earlier. No one watched a 'digital' film on Disney+ or BBC iPlayer. It was just a 'film'. It isn't 2024, when AI was still an exciting and disturbing novelty that titillated our creative and cultural palates. And sparked Us VS. It discussions of AI takeovers. As if the future could be so monumental and so easy to predict. The provocation (presented to global leaders in HE arts and education in the UK and in multiple satellite campuses around the world) considered a future of AI ubiquity when practically all creative output contains at least a trace of algorithmic generation - and with it problems of ownership, bias and organisational censorship that will impact art and design education and the wider creative community. The workshop that follows challenges attendees to consider the issues of a creative AI future through past generative approaches: from Dadaist surrealism and the procedural literature of Oulipo to the musical cut ups of Bowie and the instruction based artistic schemes of Sol Le Witt. Attendees will be guided through team and individual processes that spark discussion and ideas to help us prepare a plan for a future where AI is never far from creative production.