I Am Alive! I Exist!
After a long, arduous stretch, my first year of grad school is officially over. The bureaucracy of UCLA hasn't killed me (yet), and I feel like a brand new artist. Here's a list of things I did this past year:
I learned how to create websites and web art using JavaScript, Python, CSS, and HTML. As a result, I've created a promotional landing page for [cod] ]catfish[, and a 1/3rd of the web experience for the overall project. Creative coding in general is becoming a more exciting terrain for work to live in, and I'm even feeling inspired to teach a Writing for Digital Media course next year at UCLA.
Quite unexpectedly, I've been using Adobe Photoshop to create graphics for my plays, and I feel like I've learned so much about the power of integrating my visual mind into my writing. I wrote two new plays, with a third one to be finished this summer - each one incorporating some kind of playfulness with text and graphics.
Design, particularly experience design, was something that I was able to explore last term. I took a course led by Disney Imagineers, and learned some ways of thinking about experience design that have been very helpful. Mind you: I have a parenthesis in my artist name and I talk too much about institutional trauma, so working for Disney isn't really in the cards for me tbh. (Though I might say yes to an offer if it were the right gig.)
I love the DMA Fablab! A few months ago, I built an altar (pictured below) that doubles as a server by using table saws, wood glue, and paint, and I never thought I would end up healing my theatre production trauma from so many years ago. In the last few weeks of the class, I even got to play with a 3D printer and I got a tutorial in how to use an Arduino. A membership at a maker space is definitely something I'd like to have in the future.
Education was something I was trying to avoid after working K-12 a few years ago, but I was pleased to learn that I actually do enjoy teaching. This past winter I taught my first-ever college course in Interdisciplinary Playwriting, and I got a lot out of that experience! It was a pleasure to work with a group of undergrads who brought so much of themselves to their artistry, who are asking some of the same questions I've been asking myself for the past 10 years. It's extremely humbling.
While all of this reads great on a screen, it feels strange to be enjoying so much of my life under the backdrop of the ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people. Just a few weeks ago, I participated in the encampment protests at UCLA, which proved to be one of the more violent instances of police brutality against college students. A question I currently wrestle with is whether a college environment is capable of being a container for radical, confrontational art.
...From my view on the inside, it seems unlikely. I have so many ideas that I want to explore with audiences, but I don't trust UCLA's ability to support me and my politics. What is the purpose of my art if it's not trying to make an impact? Do faculty and administrators get to decide what is impactful and what isn't? How can I push past all these underlying power dynamics to reach the audiences I want to reach?
My primary source of hope is in my classmates - both grad and undergrad. They are the lifeblood of UCLA. When I look at whatever the algorithm feeds me on my device, I feel a dystopian depression that makes me want to evaporate. When I'm on the streets IRL with protestors and union workers, it humanizes me and fills me with hope. I am no longer convinced that watching reels of dying children and reposting to "raise awareness" is what I should be doing right now. Something about me wants to move out of the performative, and into the collaborative.
I have lots of ideas about this for a Turner Prize, but it has to stay hush-hush until I at least complete the first draft of the play. It's funny to me that people are so scared of AI right now, because after working collaboratively with ChatGPT 4, I can't imagine a more inefficient "emerging technology" than an LLM. It's been painfully slow and tedious, and while I'm trying to harness that energy into something useful, this will hopefully be the one and only time I use generative AI to co-write a play.
There have certainly been moments about using AI that have surprised me in a positive way. One scene around the midpoint of the play stands out as a moment where I was really impressed by ChatGPT. These technologies are definitely capable of creating abstract, divergent, and compelling art...but it requires a human with a code editor in order to make it. But of course, this should be seen as a good thing. Humans are a necessary part of making the proliferation of these technologies into something more equitable.
As a counterexample, I participated in an AI study at UCLA's Computer Science department where they asked writers to test out an LLM software that a group of students were creating. Based on the description I read via email, I knew I was in for a dehumanizing experience. But little did they know that they too were being studied. While I "participated" in their experiment, I spent a lot of time observing the awkwardness and micromanagement of the human AI scientists who were conducting the study.
Walking out of the study I began to wonder: "Do people go into AI research because they secretly don't want to deal with humans?" I will be very honest and say that my initial interest in AI came from a place of not wanting to hire humans because I did not want to participate in the drudgery/lottery of applying for grants and opportunities just so I can hire more humans for my projects.
People often worry about AI replacing artists, but my counterpoint is that you can't replace what was never chosen. I always feel like I have to fight for my work to be seen, especially when I was living in Philadelphia where there were so few opportunities to be had. Before we even question the ethics of AI, I wish we would question our own humanity first and how we support people in community.
Another counterexample was an AI ethics panel I watched via Zoom, which was intended to educate people on bias in generative AI models. While I agreed with many of the points that the panelists raised, I began to notice a dynamic that I've seen in so many theatre spaces: all-white panels of educators speaking on systemic bias. How can the tech industry transform itself if it continues to perpetuate so much of the very bias it's trying to fight against?
Quite frankly, I'm so bored by listening to what white people have to say about the tech industry. I want to know what the global majority has to say, and while these spaces and resources exist, it's frustrating to see so much hegemony from people who want to fight for social justice in the tech industry. It's frustrating that so much of this mirrors what I've experienced after working in theatre, but I can't say that I'm surprised.
But I want start to wrap things up on a lighter note, so here's some examples of digital resources and spaces that go against the grain of what I'm complaining about:
[cod] ]catfish[ had its first developmental showing for the public just two weeks ago. My collaboration with Diana felt great, and my cast brought so much value to the work that I'm deeply grateful for. Working with humans will always feel better than working with AI, and there is nothing I love more than being in the room with other artists trying to make things happen. If anyone reading this happens to have any leads on where I can get more development funds or places that might produce this work, please let me know!
This summer I will be participating in the Sewanee Writers Conference through a fellowship I received from The Sol Project and taking figure drawing classes to prepare myself for animation courses this coming Fall. And (unfortunately) doing Uber Eats. If anyone happens to be reading this, please reach out if you have any leads on summer jobs!
Abrazos,
(os)