Fake Plants, Real Prints

Handmade cyanotype prints printed from images generated using Midjourney AI and the prompt: studio photograph of an unhealthy house plant. The prints are limited to 1/1 and are titled by the generator using the provided seed phrase associated with each outcome. This conceptual project is a collaboration between human and machine and directly questions the value of art created in whole or part by AI, as well as whether or not AI itself can be considered an art form. Much like the Pictorialists with their petroleum jelly-smeared lenses that created photographs that resembled accepted styles of painting as a way to validate photography as an art form, this sleight of hand attempts to use established visual methods for traditional artworks to imbue these AI-assisted creations with the same power and perceived value of the “real” thing.

Illustrations and Titles by Midjourney AI, Handmade Cyanotype Prints by Todd Dobbs

~5×5-inch printed area on 7×10-inch sheet, hand titled, numbered, and signed (signature redacted in this version)

Available for exhibition, but not for sale.