mini-workshop @uni Michigan on genAI

On the 9th of April, I was invited to give a talk and run a mini-online workshop at the University of Michigan, as part of the course on Design for HRI, coordinated by the brilliant Patricia Alves-Oliveira.

The workshop focused on exploring generative AI, text-to-image platforms more specifically, as tools for exercising imagination. On this occasion, we set out to break free from the traditional idea of “Michigan as a state of cars” and “Detroit as Motor City”. We explored how genAI can help us visualize different identities and ‘natures’ of the city of Detroit.

Students were quickly confronted with how these tools reflect our limits of imagination, e.g., having trouble visualizing vehicles as something different than a car. At the same time, however, interesting hybrids also came out, e.g. with students ‘playing’ around the iconic image of the Ford T (probably the emblem of Detroit as Motor City) and conceptually displacing it as a water vehicle made of wood. These examples quickly manifested how genAI tools can also serve as powerful tools for estrangement and questioning.

A group ‘imagined’ what a Ford Model T would have looked like if instead of making cars, Ford made boats for the water channels of the Detroit city.