Hard Work vs. Hard Fun: The Zora AI Portrait Series
I do not always feel colored. Even now I often achieve the unconscious Zora of Eatonville before the Hegira. I feel most colored when I am thrown against a sharp white background. — Zora Neale Hurston, “How It Feels to Be Colored Me”
I’m closing out Women’s History Month with a focus on Zora Neale Hurston who was a writer, anthropologist, folklorist, and filmmaker during the time of the 20th century Harlem Renaissance. Her research centered early-20th-century southern life during Jim Crow and she published research on Hoodoo and Vodou. Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937) was Zora’s most mainstream novel. Her fieldwork inspired me when I was a PhD candidate:
What I want to suggest instead is that hard work is necessary for our happiness and well-being.
Hurston’s work with the Federal Writers’ Project (FWP) in Florida, specifically her documentation of African-American culture and folklore, led to her collection of stories and songs from local communities, which included work songs and folk songs. Hurston earned a great deal of notoriety due to her convictions about Black culture and folk expression. Critics attacked Hurston for utilizing Black vernacular in her writings.
Vernacular is deeply intertwined with a community’s cultural identity, carrying its history, traditions, and values. Vernacular is an important part of my work, as well. The title of my book (Techno-Vernacular Creativity & Innovation) looks at how historically marginalized groups engage in STEAM fields. Hurston’s fieldwork process centers ‘hard work’ that can provide a foundation for progress and achievement. On the other hand, ‘practice’ helps people to refine their skills and improve their performance. When people don’t regularly practice what they learn they can forget their key aspects of who they are. This is why I sometimes draw portraits.
There’s a lot of hard work (labor) behind the practice of drawing. I majored in visual art in high school where I learned how to draw, paint, and sculpt. Daily classes allowed me to practice what I learned. During my last year I learned about ‘computer graphics’ and after years of practicing visual art I pivoted and embraced CG (digital art). My earliest CG work consisted of pixelated images and I simulated what I was learning in my other classes, especially collage. I loved my mixed media class and I wanted to bring aspects of collage into the computer artwork.
What I was developing was a ‘collage vernacular’ that refers to collage techniques that use specific materials or images, often reflecting personal, cultural and architectural contexts. The techniques used in vernacular collage focus on the arrangement and juxtaposition of materials rather than complex artistic processes. Layering and juxtaposing images, over drawing/painting/sculpture has always been fun for me. I spent a lot of time developing a process that shows up even in virtual 3D space. In Second Life, I added images as textures to 3D objects called prims and changed the opacity so you could see images through other images.
I was trying to find the right balance between working hard and having fun. I was embedded my collages with African-American culture and folklore. Later, I learned about ‘hard fun’, a concept that Seymour Papert coined to describe activities that are both challenging and enjoyable, where the enjoyment comes from the engagement with the task itself, rather than just the outcome. In contrast, “hard work” can be seen as the focused and sustained effort required to achieve a goal, which may or may not be enjoyable in itself.
I’ve been making these portraits daily since 2019. That’s the hard work part of my practice. The hard fun part is the collage vernacular in the prompts and ‘deep style’ applications as well as in the image compositing. My generative AI artwork combines my research (ex. fieldwork) with collage vernacular. I used my pencil sketch of Zora Neale Hurston (top) as part of a simple prompt in MidJourney (see above). But I didn’t stop there. I imported the MJ image into Deep Dream Generator and composited the results using Adobe Photoshop.
Here’s another example that was generated from the same prompt:
I have the nerve to walk my own way, however hard, in my search for reality, rather than climb upon the rattling wagon of wishful illusions. — Zora Neale Hurston
The term “vernacular” suggests a connection to a specific place, culture, or time, and the imagery used in vernacular collages often reflect these contexts. In the image above I added a layer to the base portrait using a prompt: African lace. African Laces were specifically and specially made for royalty back in the 20th century. For Marvel’s Black Panther Wakanda Forever, Ruth Carter designed a shoulder piece made from African lace designed in a circuit pattern and 3D-printed (see below). Director Ryan Coogler said, “Ruth and her team paid respect to specific tribal inspirations that we came up with while creating a look that was entirely unique.”
This is one example of merging research/fieldwork with collage vernacular (and digital fabrication) in creative practice. Some of the designs used by Ruth Carter were algorithmic, as well. A few years later I had an opportunity to work with Ruth, using generative AI to develop concepts for costumes for a film. I experienced the research first-hand and challenged myself to create images that Ruth could use to design costumes.
What Zora Neale Hurston represents for me is ‘hard fun’ and I’ve been fortunate to research African-American culture and folklore, as a PhD candidate and as an artist. It’s a rich tapestry woven from oral traditions, storytelling, and lived experiences that played a crucial role in preserving cultural identity and transmitting history during and after slavery, influencing American culture in profound ways. I feel like we owe it to Zora, Ruth and others to bring this hard work into all of our creative endeavors and now more than ever before. This is what I bring to the generative AI space and, hopefully, its reflected in the images I create.