Impact, art, and ennui: Toward a (neural)phenomenology of generative AI art

This art-as-research autoethnography examines the disruptive influence of generative AI, positioning it at the nexus of augmented reflection and mediated normalization. It contrasts the stimulating role of creative stress , here posed as an essential resistance to complacency, with the destructive disinterest of Baudelaire’s ennui , a mediated depletion of resistance. AI emerges as a pharmakon , a dualistic tool that offers both a path to creative self-awareness and the risk of succumbing to systemic control. Adopting the perspective of neural phenomenology , affords an investigation of this ambiguity through generative text-to-image synthesis, asking how human poiesis – authentic creative emergence – can be maintained in socio-technical ecologies. The paper addresses the potential for cultural homogenization, proposing that the risk of AI model collapse might extend into culture, leading to a generic, sterilized ‘artificial creativity’. This research therefore advocates a balance that acknowledges and preserves an essential human uniqueness against the backdrop of algorithmic integration.