Larval memories

Abstract

Thanks to the virtualization of photography enabled by AI, we can now actualize a memory that has never existed factually. Previously, it was the indexicality of photography that authorized the reality of recollection; today, AI photography is erasing the boundary between the present and (memories of) the past. By feeding AI software with existing photographs, one can materialize a memory that is simultaneously authentic and inauthentic, and thus both legitimate and illegitimate in its embodiment of the past. This paradigm shift challenges not only our conception of recollection but also our very perception of photographic representation. It raises the question whether AI-generated photographs can present us with possible memories of the past. If so, what is the ontological status of an AI-generated memory whose nature is synthetic? Simply put, can we assign any mnemonic value to memories actualized through AI photography? To answer these questions, I will draw on the conjunction of memory and photography in the AI-generated photos of visual artist Alexey Yurenev.