What Would an 100-person AI Art Collective Do?
"You don't have to be a genius, find your scenius."
I told you last month that we were founding a mystery school, an announcement which was greeted by a 5.3 magnitude earthquake in Oaxaca, Mexico that shook my bed real good.
I didn’t tell you my long-term vision, partly because it’s just so damn BIG. In the last weeks, however, I’ve been having enough private conversations about the generative AI tsunami that’s made it clear to me that it’s time to get on top of that mission sooner than later.
My friend Kris Krug says in the video below, "the game is going to be won by those who can train the best AIs."
I’ll go a step further - the game will be won by the groups of people who will network their trained models and learn to merge our consciousnesses. Let’s generate collective works of art and see what’s possible, eh?
Let’s support each other also in our individual expressions to make each other stronger and wiser. There’s so much to learn we can’t possibly learn it all by ourselves. We need a scenius like the ones that birthed nearly every artistic movement you’ve ever heard of. “Scenius” is a term coined by our lord and savior, Brian Eno, to describe the group of peers who create new, meaningful work.
“If you look back closely at history, many of the people who we think of as lone geniuses were actually part of “a whole scene of people who were supporting each other, looking at each other’s work, copying from each other, stealing ideas, and contributing ideas.”
– Austin Kleon, Show Your Work
Is what we make beautiful? Will it be good? Does it provoke a new thought, feeling, or knowing?
If not, we simply trash it and keep going on to the next one until we find what captures the je ne sais quoi of this eternal magic moment.
AI is the next mycelium of connection.
This mystery school is not just any random collective. It needs to have a guiding purpose to so that these specific 100 souls out of 8 billion will come together with a strong resonance and chemistry.
We are, after all, attempting creative alchemy. That’s the whole point.
We will be using AI to make art that’s about healing the divide between men and women and between our masculine and feminine energies. It’s here to demystify sacred sexuality and connect us to the currents and currency of our aliveness.
Sex surely is one of the most potent and direct ways to find the juice of our aliveness. There are six additional pillars. Thusly –
Sex
: How to build romantic relationships powerful and juicy enough to be worth sticking around a lifetime for.Psyche/delics
: Sober or plant-based medicine to pop up above the state of consciousness that created the blockages to our creative alivenessSound
: Music for changing your brain state and creating healingScience
: The truth of the objective worldSpirituality
: The truth of the subjective worldStory
: The transmission lines of archetypal truths and mythologies which are capable of becoming visible in the world so that they can transmit their healingSecrets
: The closed container to explore our unique voice of truth with people we’ve built the trust necessary to do so in safety and freedom
If these aren’t your jam, I’m sure there will be many AI collectives popping up in the near future so don’t worry about missing out on one that’s a perfect fit for you.
I know that AI has the potential to be the mycelium of a more connected consciousness. Is it without risk? Absolutely not. Can it be misused? For sure. Do we need to be aware of corporate and governmental interests which are not aligned with ours and take mitigating steps? Double for sure. Will we have to create the future we want to live in? Triple quadruple infinituple, yes for sure.
All things that are powerful are also *potentially* dangerous.
Your kitchen knife is sharp because it must be to meet the requirements of being a knife that’s useful for service. If it is not sharp, it isn’t the tool you need it to be. AI is no different. I need/want/require an AI art collective precisely so that we can venture into the exploration of this power responsibly.
There’s a hell of a lot to say about what we learn about that in the coming months and years and decades. This will be the place to be to hear what we learn, so subscribe if you aren’t already.
Also… we are doing this BECAUSE IT’S GOING TO BE FUN.
Remember fun? When’s the last time you had fun? Using your voice is fun. Making things with a rad crew of rabble rousers is fun. Exploring and poking around at something that’s never existed in the history of this planet is FUN.
The edge of consciousness is a fun place to live or at least to visit on a regular basis.
I’ve been having so much damn fun making images in MidJourney. It’s rewiring me in the same way a good piece of surrealist art rewires me. It opens up shades and spaces of possibility that blow me away on the regular.
Artists are now wondering if they want to become technologists.
Technologists are now curious to try their hand at being artists.
It’s about damn time. Let’s play. This is where the magic is made.
As Austin Kleon says, “you don’t have to be a genius, find your scenius.”
Come meet me and be led by our own Resident Man on Staff, David Swedlow, this Thursday 9am Pacific / noon Eastern US / 5pm London for a way of meeting together we call Authentic Relating.
It’s a place to explore your heart and gut instinct awareness with this emerging group of AI magicians. Before we make magic together, we must build some familiarity and trust!
Beginners and all beings welcome.