The Definitive Guide to Living in the Capital , Cairo , Egypt

When one stands before a work of art, regardless of medium, they instantly rush to interpret it. With visual arts, the more deeply one looks into an illustration, the more detailed their interpretation becomes and confident their air, convinced that their take is the right one.

 

“The artist uses blue here to symbolise despair” and “Look at the character’s gaze, it’s there to symbolise such and such” are the kinds of things we hear in art exhibitions or when discussing our favourite Dalí paintings with friends. We rush to give a painting meaning before we seek to understand the artist. A meaning independent of the artist but projected onto them. A meaning purely the spectator’s own, as though symbolism were all there is to art.

Artwork by Dr. Aleya Abdel Hadi & Midjourney

When you step into the world of Dr. Aleya Abdel Hadi, you’re met with vibrant colours and stunning portraits that move your very core. In her recent exhibition, Ai&Me, you were greeted with the same energy and beauty as any of her previous collections. You might forget that the illustrations are AI-generated and not believe your eyes when you remember the fact. Abdel Hadi refers to this exhibition as an “experimental trip with AI” using an artificially intelligent art generator called Midjourney. This journey with AI started as a game, a fun way to pass the time trying to figure out how these new technologies work – especially considering that her own students would soon begin to use them.

 

As an immensely successful artist and academic, it came as no surprise to see respect and praise for this breakthrough, as it was the first-ever AI-generated exhibition in Egypt. But considering how sceptical people tend to be with AI, the artist was also met with criticism that the work is inauthentic, that AI does not belong in the arts’ space, and worst of all, that it’s not “real art”. How can it portray the artist’s emotion and message if it is not the fruit of her own labour?

Artwork by Dr. Aleya Abdel Hadi & Midjourney

But those people ignore the very words of the artist. Through Abdel Hadi’s continuous search for AI-generated illustrations that depict what she means to convey, she says that Midjourney began to develop an understanding of her own identity, an identity that she has been showcasing to the public for decades. As such, how can we honestly say that this work is inauthentic?

 

“Everyone discusses my art and pretends to understand as if it were necessary to understand when it is simply necessary to love”, is a famous Claude Monet saying. It is one that resonates profoundly with Abdel Hadi’s latest exhibition. Let us suppose the illustrations did not reflect her personal style and identity. This should not dismiss the absolute beauty of these illustrations. If one were to stand before one of these illustrations, not knowing that they were AI-generated, they would jump in to explain what the artist meant to convey and give it meaning without bothering to look into the actual story behind it.

Artwork by Dr. Aleya Abdel Hadi & Midjourney

“Those who find ugly meanings in beautiful things are corrupt without being charming”, as Oscar Wilde put it in his preface to The Picture of Dorian Gray. Art exists simply to move, to comfort you. As Banksy once said, it should also serve to “disturb the comfortable”. When comfortable Luddites come to inspire ugly meaning in something as beautiful as Abdel Hadi’s Ai&Me, the words of some of the world’s greatest artists in history come to mind. After all, to quote Oscar Wilde once more, ​​“Diversity of opinion about a work of art shows that the work is new, complex, and vital. When critics disagree, the artist is in accord with himself”.