Popular online tools for text-to-image synthesis such as Stable Diffusion or Midjourney, inviting users to enter textual prompts to generate images through deep-learning models, have propelled debates on the democratization of computational creativity into the public sphere. While the discussion is certainly not void of polarized, emotional intensity, the potential impact of AI technologies on comics, a medium that has historically served as a laboratory for today’s global entertainment industries, is a case in point. With the term “synthetic comics,” I propose to describe comics content that was generated, modified or manipulated in a highly automated manner, i.e. by way of generative algorithms and Artificial Intelligence (AI), or for which computation is fundamental to understanding and constructing the intersubjective experience that they make possible. Focusing on a rapidly moving target, the research argues for a quantitative understanding of comics as an instance of Big Data and aims to examine early precedents of automation in the comics industry that suggest historical continuities with today’s “computational turn”. Following a similar dynamic in other strands of literary arts such as in Uncreative Writing, it then proposes to analyze how computational tools contribute to the reconfiguration of established craftsmanship traditions and expand the medium’s historical heritage, especially in Belgium where comics are an important component of the nation’s cultural legacy. This emergent practice forces us to reconsider the digital transformation in comics studies and this project will also contribute to current debates on art and technology, computational theories of creativity, infrastructural speculation in the arts and anticipatory media.
2023-2026, FNRS / University of Liege, Belgium. Supervisor: Björn-Olav Dozo
