Fine art and design using artificial intelligence

In a story that second-year Jessica Mach created for a design course, an origami-like paper crane flies out a bedroom window and travels to meet other paper animals throughout the night, returning before dawn. She created the entire video project by using artificial intelligence.

“I feel like AI tools can be a little bit daunting, scary, and unfamiliar,” she says, “but I think they are great and fun tools for design, and can be beneficial.”

From the Olney neighborhood of Philadelphia, Mach is a double major in psychology and design in the College of Arts and Sciences. She was drawn to design through the introductory Art, Design, and Digital Culture course she took her first semester. “I had no real experience with design, but taking that class I was exposed to a whole different mindset. It was a transformative experience,” Mach says.

“I was just fascinated by how accessible AI can be. You’re able to create all of these images and works in seconds. It’s very fast and efficient,” she says. “I sometimes can use that as an inspiration to foster more creative ideas, kind of as a reference point.”

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Mach is one of 10 students in the course Artificial Intelligence in Art: Redefining Creativity in the 21st Century taught by Lisa Park, an artist based in New York City and Korea, in her second year on Penn’s faculty at the Stuart Weitzman School of Design.

Park uses technological tools for her interactive art installations and performances, such as a heart rate monitor, brainwave device, and touch sensor to create visuals and sound in real time. At Penn she also teaches a design course that introduces the latest trends in art, design, and technology. Mach first used AI tools during that course with Park last spring.

Many art schools are now introducing AI courses, and while some faculty members may feel hesitant or excited about incorporating these tools into classes, Park believes it’s crucial to engage with them. “It is important to stay aware of this emerging trend that is reshaping the art world and to understand both the capabilities and limitations of AI,” she says. “You can use it as a collaborative tool to enhance your creative potential, reduce work time, and brainstorm ideas.”

Matt Neff, director of undergraduate fine arts and design, says that AI has lowered the barriers to entry, making art and design more accessible to a broader population. “AI is often criticized for being ‘too fast’ and not allowing students proper time or investment to digest and internalize information. I’ve seen the opposite. Students see their ideas in motion within the semester, allowing us an opportunity to be responsive and adapt while making,” Neff says. “That process has a lot of learning potential for both students and instructors. I see that in Lisa’s teaching, course design, student projects and experiences.”

Park pitched the Artificial Intelligence in Art course to Neff to have students “explore limitless possibilities of AI tools, pushing boundaries of artistic practice,” and also examine the controversies around AI, “challenging conventional notions of creativity and artistry,” she says.

“A lot of artists and designers are questioning the authorship and the copyright issues,” Park says. “All of these issues, and the ethical considerations, are ongoing. I think this needs to be talked about in class.”

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Students in the course come from varying academic backgrounds such as computer science, bioengineering, and business, without experience in design or art making. “I really want to encourage my students to experiment with these AI tools and become engaged,” Park says. Some of the tools they used in class include Adobe Firefly, Leonardo AI, Midjourney, Stable Diffusion, Google FX, Runway, Sora, and Suno.

In one assignment, Park asked students to document their dreams for seven days through writing or sketches, “capturing their subconscious using keywords, descriptions, symbols, or drawings.” They then used AI tools to generate images, which they printed out and crafted into tangible objects representing their self-portraits.

Park also asked students to create a short sound-based narrative inspired by a specific site on campus, and to develop a fictional story around an everyday object, “imagining its thoughts, emotions, or journey.” Those projects led to a fully AI-generated animated video, including a developed storyline and storyboard.

Mach, who is of Vietnamese and Chinese descent, is often at the Pan-Asian American Community House in the ARCH building, which is decorated with origami cranes on strings, the inspiration for her 90-second video.

“I asked ChatGPT to create a story about an origami paper crane that meets other origami paper animals,” Mach says, resulting in a crane flying out and meeting an origami turtle, frog, and butterfly. “Then I asked it to help me create prompts that I could put into the video.”

The program Mach used created several iterations of the video, allowing her to choose and edit those she liked most. The images are not always consistent, even with the same prompt, she says. “I did have to play around with multiple AI tools to see which one fit best with what I had in mind because you might not exactly get what you want,” she says. “It’s been really fun looking through all these AI tools that I never knew existed.”

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Drawing inspiration from Vietnamese folklore for her midterm project, Mach used the tool Figma to create an interactive game that incorporates players’ choices to determine where the story goes. Calling the game “beautifully designed,” Park says Mach has produced “outstanding design projects” using the AI tools. “What I really appreciate about Jessica is that she's been really working hard trying different AI tools in class,” Park says.

The images AI generated at first didn’t fit her vision, Mach says, so she focused on one aspect, a bear spirit that takes a journey. The game has three endings and a fourth that is secret. “I wanted the story to be whimsical and imaginary,” Mach says. “I had to figure out step by step the user journey, where they go, frame by frame, and where they end up. It was a lot to consider.”

For her final project, Mach may build on the game by adding audio and making it longer, she says. Or she may make an object related to the game, like a book or an item made on a 3D printer at the Penn Libraries’ Education Commons. “It would be cool to have something more tangible, something more interactive physically and not just digitally,” she says.

As publicity chair for the Vietnamese Students’ Association, Mach also used AI to create the T-shirt design for the group’s culture show this month.

“I really enjoy the intersection at psychology and design,” Mach says, adding that she hopes to go into product design, user-experience and user interface (UX/UI) design, or UX research. “I’m very interested in how the user interacts with these tools.” Last summer Mach was a UX/UI intern for SocialTech Labs and this summer she will be a UX/UI intern for Coded by.

“AI is definitely something that I would continue using beyond the classroom in the future,” she says, “to get some inspiration for the design process if I’m feeling stuck or want to create something new.” 

Artificial intelligence touches disciplines across campus. In a limited spring profile series, Penn Today is highlighting innovative students at Penn who are adopting this technology in a variety of projects. To learn more about how members of the Penn community are pioneering the understanding and advancement of AI, visit the Penn AI website.