Conceptual Art by Todd Dobbs

Exploring the Intersection of AI and Traditional Art

Hello again, it’s been some time.

In the Spring of 2025, my career was in overdrive; I was regularly posting to my blog, I was exhibiting consistently, and new artwork and website updates were happening on a semi-regular basis. Then life came at me like a Mack Truck at the end of last summer, and everything came to a screeching halt as I tended to my family. Now I am on the winning side of all of that and back in the saddle, so to speak.

A cyanotype print with brush strokes at the edges of the frame and hand written titles and edition numbers underneath on smooth and warm watercolor paper. The image is a studio photograph of what appears to be a houseplant, however, the tip of one of the leaves is on fire. — The above image was donated to CPAC for the Hal Gould Award Auction

I had some success exhibiting work from the first portfolio of Fake Plants, Real Prints, and was even invited to donate one to an auction for the Colorado Photographic Arts Center as part of their Hal Gould Award Ceremony in 2026 (and it was bought!). The invitation was extra special for me since the recipient of the award was my mentor, Frank Varney, who gave me my first teaching job after graduate school and showed me the ropes of surviving in academia. I knew that a second portfolio of that work would be in my future, but until recently, I was unsure exactly what form it would take.

Rewinding the tape a bit to late winter of this year, a young student in my alternative processes class posed the question, “Can you combine cyanotype prints with wet cyanotype photograms?” I had never considered this combination, but as it turns out, you can. Thank you, Gwen, for steering me in the right direction with that question. She ended up making a fabulous portfolio of photographic portraits (cyanotype) combined with beautiful wet cyanotypes using flowers as large borders for the photographs.

Fast forward to the middle of this summer. I was teaching another section of alternative processes. The week came around when I would normally demonstrate cyanotype and wet cyanotype as separate processes, but this time I decided to try combining them in one print, just like Gwen had done. Sitting on my desk was a large pile of new negatives I had printed for the next portfolio of Fake Plants, Real Prints, so I grabbed one of them to make the cyanotype that I demoed on a Monday, and then on that Friday I did a wet cyanotype around the borders of the image using flowers, sea salt, and soap suds. The print turned out amazing, and it got the wheels spinning in my creative mind.

Handmade cyanotype prints on paper surrounded by handmade wet cyanotype prints of plants and flowers. The visual content includes photographic-looking images of a houseplant (that was generated using AI) surrounded by shadow prints of plants that were made with real plants and flowers. The print is predominantly blue with accents of yellow, brown, red, and pink. There is a white outline around the photographic-looking image that separates it from the shadow images of plants. The shadow images of plants are printed flush to the border of the paper. There are handwritten titles that are long strings of numbers and text separated by dashes. The print is numbered 1/1 and dated 2026. The print is signed by the artist Todd Dobbs x Midjourney. — The above image was made as part of a class demonstration and ended up launching the next portfolio of work for this project.

I had exhibited the original iteration of this work along with real fake plants, as an installation of sorts. People seemed to like the additional layer that added to the concept, and I was one of them. With this technique of combining cyanotype with wet cyanotype, suddenly I could use real plants to frame my (real prints of) fake plants, and increase the uniqueness of each one while also increasing my physical interaction with each artwork in the process.

The original portfolio of Fake Plants, Real Prints was exhibited in groups of three along with actual fake plants, as illustrated above.

I have spent the past 4-weeks producing over 25 unique prints for this series, which I ultimately culled down to 14 final prints for the portfolio. I decided to name the new portfolio simply Fake Plants, Real Prints v2.0. Each print is a unique 1/1 edition, just as the first portfolio was. The titles of each print come from the seed that Midjourney uses to identify each individual outcome using the same prompt “studio photograph of an unhealthy houseplant”, allowing it to fully collaborate in each artwork. They are signed with my name and Midjourney, as I consider them a collaboration of sorts.

The above image shows the wet cyanotype exposure in progress.

Just as I did in the first portfolio, my probing is about the authenticity of art in the age of AI: is it art? Does it have value? Am I the creator? Is this just some type of techno-trickery? I honestly don’t have answers, but I do know this – I was excited by each unique result that the wet cyanotype process created, excited in a way I get when I make authentic artwork that is entirely human made. So in that regard, this portfolio is a success.

It feels good to be back.

March 2025 Art Exhibitions in Denver

A photograph of an eccentric middle-aged caucasian cowboy sitting on the sidewalk in front of a store window filled with the American flag. He is wearing a suit covered with patches and embroidery, with long dusty blonde hair tucked under a straw hat and sunglasses. The cowboy is sitting on an old metal lawn chair. He is wearing mismatched work boots that are covered with dust. Generated with AI.

March 2025 is shaping up to be an eventful month for me with one major exhibition and three smaller ones that I will be showing work at. If you are in the Denver metro area please try to visit the following shows during March:

A large grid layout of over 100 AI generations that look like photographs. Primarily portraiture with a variety of studio and location photographs, subjects, and props. All the photographs prominently feature the American flag and the colors red, white, and blue as well as the use of stars and stripes in the designs.

History Reimagined; curated by Samantha Johnston. Colorado Photographic Arts Center, March 1- April 12. Opening Reception: Saturday, March 1, 6-9 PM. Artist Talk: Sunday, March 2, 1-3 PM. Link to info about the show. Images Selected: from the project Typical American, 2023-24.

RMCAD Biennial Faculty + Staff Show; Philip J Steele Gallery, February 6 – April 4. Opening Reception: Thursday, February 6, 4-7 PM. Link to info about the show. Images Selected: a selection from Fake Plants, Real Prints, 2024.

A studio photograph with what appears to be piles of gold bars that fill the majority of the frame and are framed perfectly symmetrical. Framing the gold bars are crushed diamonds or glass. The shadows of three men are cast across the gold bars, also in a symmetrical arrangement.

Night Lights Denver; curated by Samantha Johnson. Projected onto the side of the Daniels + Fisher Clocktower, Denver 16th Street Mall, March 1-31. Opening Reception: Wednesday, March 5, 5:30-9 PM at Noble Riot Wine Bar. Link to info about the show. Image selected: Three Businessmen, 2022.

Less is More: A Lens-less Photography Exhibition; curated by Angela Faris Belt. Art & Design Center Jantzen Gallery at Arapahoe Community College, March 3-29. Opening Reception: Thursday March 6, 6-8 PM. Link to info about the show. Images Selected: a selection from Fake Plants, Real Prints, 2024.

History Reimagined: AI’s Role in Photography and Truth

A young beautiful caucasian woman with big, curly blonde hair is dressed in an American flag dress, with red lipstick and a white bow tied around her neck. She is standing in the front yard of a house with American flags, in a suburban neighborhood. Generated with AI.

I was recently invited to participate in an upcoming exhibition featuring myself and two other artists, Laura Rautjoki and Phillip Toledano, who have been exploring AI generations that imitate photography, as part of the 2025 Denver Month of Photography at the Colorado Photographic Arts Center this March. The show’s title is History Reimagined, and it was curated by CPAC’s director, Samantha Johnston.

I am very honored and humbled to be included in this amazing exhibition opportunity with two other talented artists exploring AI. Any of you who know me are well aware the majority of my time and energy go to my teaching job and economic survival, so promoting my art always comes in a distant third out of necessity, getting an opportunity of this magnitude is a big win for my artistic career, and it happened organically. I am also happy that the exploration I am doing into AI will have a larger audience, the discussion about AI and truth is essential as we navigate a future filled with media that will imitate reality convincingly and continue to blur the lines between fact and fiction.

Below is a brief excerpt from the curatorial statement:

Photography has long been considered a tool for documenting and understanding the world around us. But as these artists show, the rise of AI forces us to reconsider the very nature of truth in image-making. History Reimagined invites us to examine the complex relationship between image-making, bias, and historical memory, and to ask ourselves: How do we define truth in a world where the lines between real and fabricated are increasingly hard to discern? – Samantha Johnston

I will be showing work from the series Typical American, an ongoing exploration into the bias in image generators using the prompt ‘photograph of a typical American’ thousands of times over the past two years. The prompt continues to return results that depict America from a very specific viewpoint – generally older, white, male, and seemingly conservative. These results are a direct reflection of the predominant culture represented on the internet through media and advertising, also, older, whiter, and more conservative. As part of the exhibition, the artists will be participating in a round table discussion where we will have an opportunity to give context to our work and answer questions from the audience.

If you are within driving distance from Denver I hope to see you at the opening and discussion if you can work it into your schedules, details are available in the provided links in this blog post.

2024 In Review

As 2024 comes to a close I wanted to reflect on some of my professional accomplishments, but more importantly I needed to get the ball rolling again on my blog posts which have been lagging since this past summer. The reason for the lack of posts is simple, life in all forms got really busy starting in July and just mercifully let up for the final few days of the year. Mostly good busy though!

The highlight of the second half of 2024 was being asked to be a co-presenter for the 2024 RMCAD Fall Faculty Convocation Keynote Address, the topic of the talk was “AI in Education”. My co-presenter, Jillian Sinha, and I shared our research into the technology, ethics, legality, and practical applications of AI in the classroom for our colleagues attending in person in the Mary Harris Auditorium on our Denver campus and those streaming the address over Zoom across the country. This talk was given after a long list of smaller talks and roundtable discussions I have had the opportunity to give about AI in Education as well as how I use it in my artistic practice. Speaking about AI in an official capacity has become a regular event in my life this past year.

Taken at the 2024 RMCAD Fall Faculty Convocation Keynote Address. Photo Credit: James Reiman.

Jillian and I also got to do a more creative session with our colleagues where we battled it out in a version of dueling pianos where Jillian used Adobe Firefly (the ‘good’ AI from ethically sourced media) and I used Midjourney (the ‘evil’ questionably sourced AI) in a head to head competition making generations from audience made AI Generated Mad-Libs. While we battled an AI Playlist made using Suno played in the background. It ended up being a very fun, albeit slightly chaotic event.

Taken at the 2024 RMCAD Fall Faculty Convocation AI Dueling Pianos event. Photo Credit: James Reiman.

As for the creative side of life, I continue to create images for the Typical American series, with over 4,000 individual images created to date. I will be working on a second portfolio of Fake Plants, Real Prints during my sabbatical this winter and am actively seeking venues to exhibit the project in. I also will be dedicating some time to compiling my work from the project A False History of Photography, and begin to create page layouts for the book and work on the written histories that will go along with each image. Finally, a return to making the type of photographic illustrations in the style of my alter ego, Art Block, is also on the horizon in my art making future. My website will receive its annual update before the end of February as well.

A recent generation from the ongoing series *Typical American*.

In closing, I will drop a teaser and hope you will return in a couple of weeks when I can officially announce an exhibition I was invited to in conjunction with the 2025 Denver Month of Photography, but for now, I will say that it is the biggest exhibition opportunity of my career to date, and I am super excited to be able to share more soon. Happy New Year to all of you, here’s looking forward to another great year in 2025!

AI Pop-Up Exhibition

I am participating in a small group exhibition curated by TAD Projects featuring three other artists using Artificial Intelligence (AI) in their work. This pop-up show is occurring this Saturday, June 22 from 6-9 PM at the Evans School in Denver. For this show, I have created a mural print with a grid of 36 Typical Americans out of over 3,000 generations. All were created using the same prompt: photograph of a typical American.