dear Michael, and all:
I read the essay with great interest, and as you all are probably aware
also of current strenuous debates on the values and dysfunctions of AI....
I suppose I need to wait a bit. With my judgement on AI. I've avoided it,
stayed away from it, though friends & colleagues laugh at me, ridicule me
and call me old-fashioned. spme one in university told me all students are
now using ChapGPT.
I did read a series of interesting meditations/conversations with
ChapGTP/AI posted by a friend, NZ theatre director Simon Taylor (on his
blog "Outside Light"). He tried to trick AI into a sensible/non-sensible
conversation, surely not "plumpes Denken." He also worried/smiled that AI
was not fully capable of understanding irony.
Michael, your text is not easy to read, I fear (as you seem to follow
Benjamin's numbering of sections in his 20 page essay of 1936 (third
version)("The Work of Art in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility",
in* WB*, *Selected Writings* 4, ed. Eiland/Jennings), as your numbering
refers to very very short paragraphs, meandering about, and I loose your
thread (which i never do in the case of Benjamin's essay), and then got
lost entirely when you bring in Brecht, (and many other distracting
citations) who is surely ironic and sardonic, and far from a "plumpe
Denker," as you of course know. On the contrary. Brecht would have enjoyed
AI, in the theatre, perfect of his Verfremdungseffekt.
But you make many, in my view, quick comments and disqualifications,
concerning the main thread of Benjamin's beautiful essay, and of course
many of us have admired it, perhaps also unduly, with melancholy. Yet, it
is a corner stone essay of critical/theoretical philosophical reflection
(don't you love his glance at Abel Gance and early film) on new media and
"technological reproducibility" (is that not different from "generative
digital work", of the kind now apparently done by software and AI?).
My first question tonight – and I hope others here will join in – is in
regard to your concern with "aura' (or is it not authenticity that you wish
to save? your/one's craft, your/one's painting in the "here and now"
history and context of painting?)
<< ... ‘Is Benjamin’s ‘aura’ an actual thing?’..
"No—except as an indication of, a feeling for, a way of referring to the
forces, relationships
and processes involved in the making of much human-made art. There is no
chemical, physical or other test for it, no necessary and sufficient set of
conditions
and no universal set of logical or hermeneutic procedures which can
demonstrate
its presence...>>
what worries you about AI - in regard to the comments Benjamin offers on,
for example, the "aura" of nature when it overwhelms us in the mountains
and hills, or the "artistic performance' of a stage actor (directly there
in front of us)? why do we need a demonstration or definition? Do you
really think a notion of authenticity and aura ("air" in its older
Greek/Latin senses) can be a "locus of resistance' against what is
happening today, in our messed up war-torn and perverse era of advanced
digital reproducibilities of images of everything? fake or less fake?
regards
Johannes Birringer
On Fri, May 1, 2026 at 3:46 PM Michael Szpakowski via NetBehaviour <
[email protected]> wrote:
> Hi
>
> I have just had a short paper on Walter Benjamin and AI published in the
> journal ‘Arts’. It’s entitled: ‘Art and AI—Benjamin’s ‘aura’ as a Locus
> of Resistance: Notes, Theses and Images’
>
> If you’d like to read it there’s a pdf here
>
> https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0752/15/5/93/pdf
>
>
>
> If you can think of anyone who might find it of interest, or indeed be
> completely outraged by it, please feel free to forward!
>
> With warm wishes
>
> Michael
>
Johannes Birringer <[email protected]>
Fri, May 1, 8:34 PM (12 days ago)
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to NetBehaviour, m
dear Michael,
thanks for sharing this, and the topic you chose is a fascinating one
(though I tremble in fear and anticipation regarding your take on the
now disreputable old 'aura' in Benjamin's thinking nearly a hundred years
ago), all auras have been discredited, I assumed........
I look forward to reading your essay and hope for a stimulating discussion
here, we have not had that in a while, I think.
with warm regards to all, on International Workers' Day,
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