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I’m writing from Vancouver, where I’m attending the SIGGRAPH 2025 conference. The days here are dense, with back-to-back sessions, immersive exhibitions, and countless hallway conversations that stretch long after the schedule ends. As I move through it all, I keep asking myself: What are the most urgent questions emerging from this moment? SIGGRAPH has always impressed me with its ability to bring scientists and artists into the same room. This year is no different. Some people I meet identify firmly with one side or the other, but I also notice many who seem to inhabit a hybrid space, moving fluidly between both worlds. This year, much like the few previous ones, there are many conversations about AI and I can't help noticing a tension in how we think about this technology. On one side, some are framing it as nothing more than a tool while others see it as a form of nonhuman intelligence.  Early in the week, keynote speaker Aaron Hertzmann made a strong case for the first view. He argued that AI is not a person and therefore cannot be creative. AI-generated art, he said, is ultimately human-made art, with AI serving as just another instrument in the process. Drawing comparisons to historical shifts like the rise of photography, he reassured artists they need not fear being replaced. The room seemed to exhale - “Thank goodness, we’re not going to be replaced…” But I couldn’t help wondering: why does the question of replacement echo so persistently through conversations about AI?  In the meantime at the SIGGRAPH art gallery, a juried exhibition curated by Francesca Franco on the theme of connecting nature, art, and technology, I encountered a distinctly different energy. That same creative spark ran through the rest of the Experience Hall, which included the Immersive Pavilion and the Emerging Technologies programs curated by Saskia Groenewegen and Nathan Matsuda, respectively. Along with the new and utterly exciting Spatial Storytelling program curated by Marco Cemusoni. In the art gallery I resonated with Plant.play(), a piece by Yoonji Lee, Chang Hee Lee, and Alo Asadipour, featuring a living plant playing a pet simulation game. Environmental sensors translate the plant’s biological signals into caregiving decisions, which shape the behavior and development of a virtual pet on a nearby screen. Viewed through the lens of “replacement,” the piece becomes provocative: a plant takes the place of a human gamer, and the simulated pet stands in for a living animal. Will humans one day be replaced by plants? Will organic pets be replaced by simulated pets? And are these questions anywhere near as alarming as the one that hovers over so many AI discussions. I guess not. We rarely really worry about plants or animals replacing us. Perhaps it is because we assume a position of superiority over them and their intelligence. With AI, though, we’re less certain, especially as evidence grows that it can outperform us in task after task.  To dismiss AI as “just a tool” may be one of our attempts to reaffirming superiority. Over dinner with SIGGRAPH pioneer Julian Gomez, he reminded me of a quote attributed to Albert Einstein: "If you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing it is stupid". Like many other nonhuman intelligences, we insist on judging their abilities according to human terms, comparing them to what we can do and eventually dismissing them for who they are. To be honest, I don’t think we spend enough time acknowledging that despite the fact that these intelligences might not be able to do things we humans do, their abilities are still curious and interesting, and may even be beyond our comprehension. When we insist on a narrow, human-centered lens, we often miss the opportunity to better understand their intelligences.  Moving in and out of the convention center, I kept noticing the nonhumans around me: bee colonies buzzing outside the windows, a cricket landing beside me at lunch, seagulls gliding over the Vancouver port, the lush living roof above the building. Inside, artworks echoed this presence: an animated flock of glass seagulls, a helium sea-mammal balloon flapping its fins in response to visitors’ hand gestures, a delicate mechanical mimosa plant that opened when approached. Reminding us that intelligence, responsiveness, and creativity take many forms.
 Other works invited attendees to reimagine their own bodies and explore other modes of being: mechanical finger extensions positioned as artificial parasites that moved and sensed the world in their own way while being attached to a human body. Another piece offered visitors to experience the presence of an artificial tail attached to their bodies. And our own piece, which I have presented with Adam Wright, invited people to consider having a conversation with inanimate objects, treating them as active, lively entities worthy of attention.   Still other works turned the lens back on human difference, offering immersive perspectives of a baby, a person with ADHD, or a busy, tired, and frustrated mother, reminding us that even human experience is far from uniform.
On the day before last, I was invited by Robert Twomey and Ash Eliza Smith to perform in their Quantum Theatre. They attached QR codes to my body, draped a string of glowy sensors around my neck, and placed a VR headset over my eyes. On stage with me was Scarlett, another performer I had never met, similarly equipped with prompts and sensors. The instructions we received were deliberately vague. Robert and Ash reminded us only to stay aware of our relationship with each other, the objects, the sounds, and the surrounding environment. When the performance began, I had no idea what I was supposed to do. I could still see through the headset, so I was aware of my environment, but at the same time seeing text which overlayed it. Some of this text wasn't legible. I lifted cubes covered in QR codes. Moving them seemed to trigger subtle changes, perhaps in the temperature around my neck, or perhaps in the sounds played aloud. I am not entirely sure what changed and how, in response to some of these changes, my movements shifted. After 15 or 20 minutes of exploration, the demo ended, and I still couldn’t say exactly what had happened exactly.  Later, over coffee with Ash, we talked about how refreshing it feels to embrace not-knowing and open-endedness, especially in a space where, just across the hall, corporate booths are busy presenting polished, finalized, “finished” products, assuming to know exactly what they do and how we might use them. As I leave SIGGRAPH, I carry a clearer sense of my role and responsibility as an artist today. I wish to continue and invite a rethinking of human dominance and superiority. Shifting more regorously into post-humanistic realms I wish to offer participants moments when they can see not only themselves, but also the multitude of intelligences and agencies that surround them. And with that, also invite them to embrace the truth that we may never fully understand it all, and that this, too, is okay. ~~~ Photos shown here include: Photo 1 - An image of me by the SIGGRAPH sign, taken by Adam Wright. Photo 2 - An image of keynote presentasion given by Aaron Hertzmann. Photo 3 - The artwork Plant.play(), a piece by Yoonji Lee, Chang Hee Lee, and Alo Asadipour. Photo 4 - A cricket that joined me for lunch at the Vancouver port. Photo 5 + 6 - the artwork Mimosa Pithics by Scottie Chih-Chieh Huang, Ming-Hong Wu, Hsiu-Mei Chang, and Chin Hsun Liu (left panel) and the artwork Unbound Horizons by Lino Tagliapietra (right panel) Photo 7 - Demo of Spread Your Wings by Mingyang Xu, Yulan Ju, Qing Zhang, Christopher Changmok Kim, Qingyuan Gao, Yun Suen Pai, Giulia Bardareschi, Matthias Hoppe, Kai Kunze, Kout Minamizawa Photo 8 - Demo of Parasitic Finger by Akira Nakayasu, Saki Sakaguchi, and Mina Shobasaki Photo 9 - Adam and I talking with a Pepsi Can at our Fast Forward presentation. Photo taken by Everardo Reyes. Photo 10 + 11 - Demo of Primordial Reality by Taisuke Murakami (left pannel) and Demo of Unbalanced by Yi Chun Ka, Yu Wen Huang, and Yu Ann Lai (right pannel). Both photos taken by the presenters of the work. Photo 12 - Quantum Theatre by Robert Twomey, Ash Eliza Smith. Photo taken by Adam Wright.
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Any day is a good day to start a blog. This one will focus on my experiences with art-making, art-viewing, and art-thinking. For a long time, I struggled to express myself in writing. English is not my first language, which made it even more challenging. However, with the advent of large language models (LLMs), every piece of text I write, whether it's a short email or a lengthy book chapter, now gets proofread by one LLM or another (including this post). My favorite prompt is “rewrite for clarity and coherence,” which I use to refine my text. To me, this process is like photo editing. When I was a professional photographer, no photo could be published without at least some editing.
My engagement with LLMs goes beyond writing. As you can see from my artworks, AI is my primary medium, and I explore it through performances, installations, and new media theory. I follow a practice-as-research (PAR) methodology, which is just another way of saying that I live with AI, something we all do these days. Through my art, I aim to understand its impact on my life, behavior, and social interactions. Beyond creating art, I also maintain a dedicated practice of art viewing. I regularly visit museums and galleries to see what other artists are making and what they are thinking about. Contemporary art is my favorite, though I also take time to appreciate modern and classic works. My art-making is constantly in dialogue with the work of others. I don’t work in a vacuum, and I find it difficult to claim that my work is entirely original because, honestly, I don’t believe anything can be called truly original. The art I encounter is an essential source of inspiration for me. Sometimes, the connection is obvious, and my work responds directly to something I've seen. Other times, the influence is less clear, but I know it’s there. Art-thinking includes engaging in conversations, reading books and articles, and spending time reflecting and formulating questions or answers in my mind. These activities also inspire my art in various ways. In fact, this blog will be part of my art thinking in itself. As I continue to explore, I hope to share insights, inspirations, and reflections that spark meaningful conversations and discussions. I invite you to join me in this ongoing dialogue with art, AI, and the world around us. I look forward to hearing your thoughts and reflections as we navigate this ever-changing landscape. |
AuthorAvital Meshi - New Media and Performance Artist, making art with AI. Currently a PhD Candidate at the Performance Studies Graduate Group at UC Davis. Archives
November 2025
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