Çiğdem Karabağ and İlke Tekin
pp. 231 – 258, download
(https://doi.org/10.55612/s-5002-064-006)
Abstract
The dream world of Surrealism bases itself on critical ways of thinking contrary to the status quo that envision new ways of life. Today, these imaginations are reflected in speculative fiction produced with artificial intelligence (AI) software. Generative AI creates visuals from text using existing digital datasets. AI-generated speculative fiction fosters critical thinking by expanding intellectual boundaries and is a remarkable innovation in human and robot collaboration. The aim in this paper is to examine AI’s speculative creation processes and limits of imagination and conduct a comparative analysis through AI reproductions of surrealist spaces. This analysis involves surrealist architect Frederick Kiesler’s “Endless House”. This two-stage study was conducted with an exploratory case study model using generative AI applications and visual data analysis. The analysis compared the outputs of the Midjourney AI, OpenAI, Leonardo AI, and DALL-E 3 applications, and discussed the exploration process of Midjourney in detail. The findings show that AI’s exploration process and limitations depend on how defined the subject is in the prompt text and the meanings and the weight in the databases of the keywords used.
Keywords: Artificial intelligence, Midjourney, Surrealism, Speculative fiction, Frederick Kiesler.
References
1. Gombrich, E. H.: The Story of Art, 16th Edition, Phaidon Press, London (1995)
2. Breton, A.: Manifestos of Surrealism, Translated from the French, Richard Seaver & Helen R. Lane, The University of Michigan Press, p. 26 (1929)
3. Veseley D.: Surrealism, Myth & Modernity, Architectural Design, 48, Dalibor Vesely, pp. 87-95 (1978)
4. Vidler, A.: Fantasy, The Uncanny and Surrealist Theories of Architecture, Papers of Surrealism, p. 3 (2003) Accessed: Oct. 25, 2023. [Online] Available: https://studylib.net/doc/8353038/fantasy–the-uncanny-and-surrealist-theories-of-architecture
5. Philips, S.: Introjection and Projection: Frederick Kiesler and his Dream Machine, in Surrealism and Architecture, ed. Thomas Mical, Routledge, London and New York, pp. 186-233 (2004)
6. Dunne, A., Raby, F.: Speculative Everything: Design, Fiction, and Social Dreaming, The MIT Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, p. 2, 147 (2013)
7. Coles, A.: (Ed.) Design Fiction, Sternberg Press, Berlin (2016)
8. Latour, B.: Reassembling The Social: An Introduction to Actor-Network Theory. Oxford University Press, New York, p. 39, 109 (2005) https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/97801 99256044.001.0001
9. Marenko, B.: FutureCrafting: A Speculative Method for an Imaginative AI. In: The 2018 AAAI Spring Symposium Series, pp. 419-422 (2018)
10. Nilson, N. J.: The Quest for Artificial Intelligence: A History of Ideas and Achievements, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge (2010)
11. Finn, E.: What Algorithms Want. Imagination in the Age of Computing, The MIT Press, Cambridge, p. 2, 55 (2017) https://doi.org/10.7551/mitpress/9780262035927.001.0001
12. Marenko, B., Van Allen, P.: Animistic Design: How to Reimagine Digital Interaction between the Human and the Non-human. Digital Creativity. Special issue: Post-anthropocentric Creativity. (Eds.) Stanislav Roudavski and Jon McCormack, Routledge, London, pp. 52-70 (2016) https://doi.org/10.1080/14626268.2016.1145127
13. Farthing, S.: (Eds) Art: The Whole Story, Thames & Hudson, London, p. 426 (2018)
14. Klingsöhr-Leroy, C.: Surrealism, Taschen, pp. 1-95 (2004)
15. Cardinal, R.: Soluble City, The Surrealist Perception of Paris, in: Architectural Design Profile: Surrealism and Architecture, 11, Dalibor Vesely (ed.) (2-3), pp. 143-149 (1978)
16. Freud, S.: The Uncanny, Penguin Books, London (2003)
17. Foster, H.: Compulsive Beauty, Third MIT Press, Massachusetts, p. 7 (1997)
18. Löwy, M.: Morning Star Surrealism, Marxism, Anarchism, Situationism, Utopia, University of Texas Press (2009)
19. Passeron, R.: The Concise Encyclopedia of Surrealism, Omega Books, London (1984)
20. Tschumi, B.: Architecture and Its Double, in: Architectural Design Profile: Surrealism and Architecture, 11, Dalibor Vesely (ed.) (2-3), pp. 111-116 (1978)
21. Artun, A. N.: (Ed.) Mimarlığı Baştan Çıkarmak, in Sürrealizm Mimarlık Mekân Sanatı, 2nd Edition, İletişim Yayınları, İstanbul, p. 51 (2020)
22. Rosenbaum, S.: Visionary Architects: Barbara Guest, Frederick Kiesler, and the Surrealist Poetics of the Galaxy, Humanities 11(5), 113 (2022) https://doi.org/10.3390/h11050113
23. Graevenitz V. A.: Sonsuzluk ve İndirgeme: Frederick Kiesler’in Sonsuz Evi, in Sürrealizm Mimarlık Mekân Sanatı, Nur Altınyıldız Artun (ed.), 2nd Edition, İletişim Yayınları, İstanbul, pp. 399-411 (2020)
24. Lesák, B.: In Quest of the Ideal Theatre, in Frederick Kiesler 1890-1965, Yehuda Safran (ed.) Architectural Association, London, pp. 26-39 (1989)
25. Kiesler, F.: Contemporary Art Applied to The Store and It’s Display, Brentano’s, New York, p. 87 (1930)
26. Colomina, B.: Endless Interior: Kiesler’s Architecture as Psychoanalysis, in Private Utopia: Cultural Setting of the Interior in the 19th and 20th Century, August Sarnitz and Inge Scholz-Strasser (Eds.) De Gruyter, Berlin, München, Boston, pp. 124-150 (p.136) (2015) https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110455496-008
27. Kiesler, F.: Pseudo-Functionalism in Architecture, Partisan Review, pp. 733-741 (p.733) (1949)
28. Breton, A.: Surrealism and Painting, Translated from French by Simon Watson Tylor, Icon Editions Harper & Row, Publishers, New York (1972)
29. Cutieru, A.: Speculative Architecture: Where are the Contemporary Equivalents of the 60s and 70s Radical Visions?, ArchDaily (2020) [Online] Available:
https://www.archdaily.com/951803/speculative-architecture-where-are-the-contemporary-equivalents-of-the-60s-and-70s-radical-visions
30. Iwabuchi, M.: Speculative Design and Designed Realities: How to design futures in the 2020s, UX Planet (2022) [Online] Available: https://uxplanet.org/speculative-design-and-designed-realities-ade514cc3426
31. Kaplan, A., Haenlein, M.: Siri, Siri, in My Hand: Who’s the Fairest in the Land? On the Interpretations, Illustrations, and Implications of Artificial Intelligence. Business Horizons, 62(1), pp. 15-25 (p.19) (2019) https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bushor.2018.08.004
32. Kaptelinin, V., Nardi, B. A.: Acting with Technology: Activity Theory and Interaction Design. The MIT Press, Cambridge (2006) https://doi.org/10.5210/fm.v12i4.1772
33. Rose, J., Jones, M.: The Double Dance of Agency: A Socio-theoretic Account of How Machines and Humans Interact. Systems, in Systems, Signs & Actions, 1(1), pp. 19-37 (2005)
34. Latour, B.: We Have Never Been Modern, Translated by Catherine Porter, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, p. 34 (1993)
35. Latour, B.: The Pasteurization of France, Harvard University Press, Massachusetts, p.157 (2010)
36. Latour, B.: Politics of Nature: How to Bring The Sciences Into Democracy, Harvard University Press, Massachusetts, p. 75 (2004) https://doi.org/10.4159/9780674039964
37. Aanestad, M., Hanseth, O.: Implementing Open Network Technologies in Complex Work Practices: A Case from Telemedicine, in Organizational and Social Perspectives on Information Technology, R. Baskerville, J. Stage, and J. I. DeGross (Eds.), Kluwer Academic Publishers, Boston, pp. 355-369 (p.357) (2000) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-35505-4_21
38. Jang, S., Nam, K.Y.: Utilization of Speculative Design for Designing Human-AI Interactions, in Archives of Design Research, 35(2), pp. 57-71 (p.58) (2022) https://doi.org/10.15187/adr.2022.05.35.2.57
39. Lindley, J., Coulton, P., Sturdee, M.: Implications for Adoption. In: Proceedings of the 2017 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, pp. 265-277, Association for Computing Machinery (2017) https://doi.org/10.1145/3025453.3025742
40. Flusser, V.: Into The Universe of Technical Images, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, p. 47 (2011) https://doi.org/10.5749/minnesota/9780816670208.001.0001
41. Poltronieri, F. A., Heilmair, A. F.: Synthetic Images and Creative AI: A Discussion on the Nature and Production of Images in the Era of Deep Learning. In: xCoAx 2021 9th Conference on Computation, Communication, Aesthetics & X, Miguel Carvalhais, Mario Verdicchio, Luísa Ribas and André Rangel (Eds.), pp. 30-45 (p.43) (2021) https://doi.org/10.5749/minnesota/9780816670208.001.0001
42. Güçlü, İ.: Sosyal Bilimlerde Nitel Araştırma Yöntemleri Teknik-Yaklaşım-Uygulama, Nika Yayınevi, İstanbul, p. 371 (2021)
43. Creswell, W. J.: Qualitative Inquiry & Research Design Choosing Among Five Approaches, 3rd edition, SAGE Publications, Los Angeles, London (2013)
44. Barlett, L., Vavrus, F.: Rethinking Case Study Research: A Comparative Approach, Routledge, New York and London (2016) https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315674889
45. Babbie, E.: The Practice of Social Research. 20th Edition, Cengage Learning, Wadsworth (2007)
46. Margolis, E., Pauwels, L.: (Eds.) Visual Research Methods, Sage Publications, London (2011)
47. Cao, Y., Li, S., Liu, Y., Yan, Z., Dai, Y., Yu P.S., Sun, L.: A Comprehensive Survey of AI-Generated Content (AIGC): A History of Generative AI from GAN to ChatGPT. In arXiv:2303.04226 [cs.AI] ACM 37, 4, Article 111 (2018) https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2303.04226
48. Pallant, J.: Creating Images Using AI: A Step-by-Step Guide to Midyourney, CRC Publishing, London (2025) https://doi.org/10.1201/9781003541677
49. Bernstein, P.: Machine Learning Architecture in The Age of Artifical Intelligence, RIBA Publishing, London (2022) https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003297192
50.Open AI.: Introducing OpenAI (2025) Retrieved Jan 16, 2025 from https://openai.com/index/introducing-openai/
51.Leonardo AI.: Creativity, Unleashed (2025) Retrieved Jan 16, 2025, from https://leonardo.ai/
52.Open AI.: DALL-E: Creating images from text (2025) Retrieved Jan 16, 2025, from https://openai.com/research/dall-e
53.Midjourney: About, Executives (2025) Retrieved Jan 16, 2025 from https://www.midjourney.com/home
54. Midjourney Inc. (2023) Retrieved Sep. 10, 2023 from https://golden.com/wiki/ Midjourney_Inc.-BYNW6BG
55. Jaruga-Rozdolska, A.: Artificial Intelligence as Part of Future Practices in the Architect’s Work: MidJourney Generative Tool as Part of a Process of Creating an Architectural Form, Architectus, 3 (71), pp. 95-104 (p.97) (2022) https://doi.org/10.37190/arc220310
56. Ruskov, M.: Grimm in Wonderland: Prompt Engineering with Midjourney to Illustrate Fairytales, in: 19th Conference on Information and Research Science Connecting to Digital and Library Science, CEUR WS vol. 3365, pp. 180–191 (2023) DOI: 10.48550/arXiv.2302.08961 Available: https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-3365/paper6.pdf
57. Palmieri, A.: Midjourney Experimentation: Representing Nature on a Macro Scale, in Scientific Research and Information Technology Ricerca Scientifica e Tecnologie dell’Informazione Vol 13, Issue 1, 181-188. e-ISSN 2239-4303 (2023) DOI: 10.2423/i22394303v13n1p181
58. Pena, L.C., Carballal, A., Rodríguez-Fernandez, N., Santos, I., Romero, J.: Artificial Intelligence Applied to Conceptual Design: A Review of Its Use in Architecture, in Automation in Construction, Elsevier, vol. 124, pp. 1-30 (2021) https://doi.org/10.1016/j.autcon.2021.103550
59. Tanugraha, S.: A Review Using Artificial Intelligence-Generating Images: Exploring Material Ideas from MidJourney to Improve Vernacular Designs, in JARINA – Journal of Artificial Intelligence in Architecture, Vol. 2, No. 1, pp. 48-57 (2023) https://doi.org/10.24002/jarina.v2i2.7537
60. Yıldırım, E.: Text-to-image generation A.I. in Architecture, in Art and Architecture: Theory, Practice and Experience, H. Hale Kozlu (Ed.), pp. 97-119, Livre de Lyon, Lyon (2022)
61. Ploennigs, J., Berger, M.: AI Art in Architecture, in AI in Civil Engineering, vol. 2:8, pp. 1-11 (2023) https://doi.org/10.1007/s43503-023-00018-y
62. Marin, P., Lescop, L.: How AI Challenges Architectural Design, in Envisioning Architectural Scales in the Analogue and Virtual Representation of Architecture: Proceedings of the 16th EAEA Conference, A. Kreutzberg (Ed.), Royal Danish Academy, Copenhagen, pp. 249-258 (2023) https://doi.org/10.60558/eaea16-2023-311
63. Radhakrishnan, M.: Is Midjourney-Ai the New Anti-Hero of Architectural Imagery & Creativity? Global Scientific Journals GSJ, Vol. 11, Issue 1, pp. 94-104 (2023) DOI: 10.11216/gsj.2023.01.102270
64. Enjellina, Beyan, E.V.P., Rossy, A.G.C.: A Review of AI Image Generator: Influences, Challenges, and Future Prospects for Architectural Field, in JARINA – Journal of Artificial Intelligence in Architecture E-ISSN: 2829-6257 Vol. 2, No. 1, pp. 53-65 (2023) https://doi.org/10.24002/jarina.v2i1.6662
65. Buhmann, B.: Across the Atlantic: The Correspondence and Friendship between Hans Arp and Frederick Kiesler, in Hans Arp and the United States, Maike Steinkamp and Loretta Würtenbergerp (Eds.), Stiftung Arp e.V. Papers, Berlin, pp. 88-107 (2016)
66. Kiesler, F.: The Endless House: A Man-Built Cosmos, in Inside The Endless House, Art, People and Architecture, Simon and Schuster, New York, pp. 566-569 (p.566) (1966)