“Art is a lie that tells the truth”- Picasso
In my latest post, I was talking about Roy Lichtenstein and how he uses exaggeration to make a point. His exaggeration points toward truth, not away from it. It reminds me of the famous Picasso line: “art is a lie that tells the truth”. Exaggeration does not always mean dishonesty.
One example of this is Lichtenstein’s depiction of traditional gender roles. The beautiful, emotional woman and the handsome man who is either coming to her rescue, romancing her, or doing some other traditionally “manly” thing like driving a car. His works were made in the second half of the 20th century. Gender roles were very rigid back then and he was making fun of it.
While I was writing my blog post about it, I tried to include that Picasso line but I realized I could write a whole blog post about it. I wanted more space to muse.
Exaggeration in Art
When does exaggeration tend toward authenticity and when does it take away from it? Art has a great power to illuminate truth without saying a word. With the Lichtenstein example, he was illuminating truth through exaggeration. But what about the opposite, such as propaganda?
Imagery has a sliding scale in its relation to truth and dishonesty. What affects this? The artist’s intention? The viewer’s perspective? The biases of either the artist or viewer?
I am trying to lose the distortion from my life in the way I see myself or the world. Even if I am not entirely distorted in my thinking, I want to be conscious in my interpretation of these things. I want to question it. I am going to think more about my ability to consciously recognize the relationship between images and truth.
Images & Truth
Understanding the nature of images will be a very serious topic in the coming years, especially as AI images get better and better.
I think art will need to be emphasized more as a school subject in the upcoming years. Well, not art specifically but rather something like “Our Relation to Images”.
This is especially true because we have shifted towards an increasingly visual economy and society. Imagery matters. It affects how we see the world. We communicate so much through visuals nowadays.
Art teaches us to question images and our interpretation of them. This will become a necessity in the days of AI images, evolving forms of advertising, excessive social media use, and virtual reality. It will be easy to lose ourselves in all of this.
Our Relation to Images: Understanding Visuals in the Age of AI
If I were to provide a back-of-the-napkin brainstorm for educating people on “Our Relation to Images” in the 21st century it would include the following topics:
1. The History of Art
This would include the way images have been used to shape people and the way people in turn shape the images we see.
Art and society are symbiotic.
Imagery often reflects the times in which it occurs. For example, artists will often convey a dark, serious tone in response to difficult times such as wartime, disease, famine, or personal tragedy. You can sense the dire mood in the pictures they create.
However, art and imagery can also be used to not just reflect the times but to shape it. One way that I mentioned above would be propaganda.
2. Our Ability to Shape Perspective
The artists of the Italian Renaissance are often credited with creating (or perfecting) perspective in pictures. They used a vanishing point which makes pictures appear realistic and true to scale, as if the viewer is actually looking at a 3-dimensional scene.
These days with images, a lot of spatial perspective is taken care of for us. Our phones, for example, will take pictures where we can effortlessly tell what was closer to the lens and farther from it.
But perspective is still important for images, just this time it is not physical perspective but emotional and algorithmic perspective. This will involve three areas:
Filtering Information (Ways and Reasons)
a). Narrowed View
We think that an image shows us all that we need to know, but each image is contained within a border. We don’t know what is outside of this border, we only see the image.
The contents of the image can align perfectly with the contents of the world outside the image or it can be curated. For example, a streamer might only clean the parts of their room that are within view of the camera or they might put a background filter to cover the mess.
b). Algorithmic Centering
Algorithms too will filter what we see. This is based on what it thinks we are looking for. We aren’t seeing the whole picture, the algorithm is doing some thinking for us. It is altering our perspective.
c). Edited Images
Throughout history, people have been editing their images. Examples of this can be found in the portraits of royals and aristocracy.
Since they were the ones paying the artist for the work, they would get to decide the pose, environment, and what features they wanted the artist to emphasize. For example, a military leader might want to be painted in his military uniform, a patriarch in his hunting attire, or a lady in her best, most-flattering dress.
Empress Sisi of Austria was even said to prohibit any photography or portraits of her after she began showing signs of aging. This was an early way to filter what other people saw. It demonstrates a person’s ability to change the perspective of what is shown to a wider audience.
Nowadays, we have digital filters. You can change just about anything about yourself: your eye color, waist or chest size, the shape of your jaw line, anything. It is easier in some ways to change something digitally than physically, like applying lipstick in a photo via a filter than actually having to get up and put it on.
Biases
Both people and algorithms have biases. People’s biases tend to come from a sense of in-group/ out-group mentality. If you hate women for example, you will tend toward content that agrees with you. Your interaction with it will in turn positively impact that content’s reach, so it will grow in your feed and in those of others like you.
Algorithms tend to favor extremes, whatever will lead to more engagement. That is how those companies measure success. Netflix, for example, would consider it an incredible success if you watch 24 hours of their content each day. But that would probably not lead to the best/ happiest life for you, despite the success it would be for Netflix.
As a person, learning to ask questions about the nature of the content you consume will be important.
Who is delivering this perspective? Who is their target audience? What do they want you to see? Will they lose something (like subscribers) if they reverse course? How does the creator measure success? Is this aligned with what you consider success?
Intention
Next will be learning to ask why the image was created and distributed. What was the purpose? Was it to make money? Promote something? Disseminate information?
Does it cost you anything to consume the image? Time? Money? Your values? Your relationship to your family? What is the reason you are viewing it and keep coming back to that sort of content?
3. Feelings/ Interpretation
Art is powerful in the ways it can affect people. It moves us. So asking ourselves how we feel about images is an important step.
Are you happier for looking at the image? Angrier? Why? Two people can look at the same picture and have two completely different reactions. Here are three examples of this:
- A mom and daughter look at a photo of a thin, distressed child in a jungle
- The mom is deeply moved by this piece, posts about it, and donates to the website
- The daughter recognizes signs that it is AI generated and goes on with her day without being emotionally touched by the photo
- A photo of immigrants getting off a bus
- One person sees this as an “invasion” and their anger escalates
- Another person sees this as a “crisis” and their empathy escalates
- A customer unknowingly brings an AI generated photo into a salon, bakery, etc. to buy a custom product
- The worker explains that the design is impossible for reality, they are flabbergasted
- The would-be customer is disappointed and angry that the order could not be completed to their satisfaction
Each of these people were affected differently by the photo they saw.
4. Images and Their Relationship to Reality (As We Know it)
Sometimes there are stories in the news where a person falls for a scam. They may have sent an incredible amount of money and be emotionally devastated.
When the scene pans to the photos that were used to dupe the victim, that is when the victim often loses sympathy from others. Sometimes the photos are so obviously fake that people adopt a “well, you should’ve known better” attitude toward the victim.
But photos and their relationship to reality will be something that we need to consider. This is one thing for poorly generated AI or photoshopped photos, it will be another in terms of virtual reality.
What are the factors that make us believe an image is real? These will be different for everyone and we will not look at each image with the same amount of information.
A scam victim might believe a poorly photoshopped photo because they have seen plenty of other photo “evidence” up to that point. They have developed trust in the source of the photos whereas those of us on the outside looking in have not.
A Personal VR Example
I recently did a virtual reality experience. It started with me sitting at the bedside of a dying historical figure and included flashbacks to some memorable moments in their life. During some of those moments I actually felt myself energetically and emotionally reacting to the circumstances.
For example, when we “were” by a lake in the mountains, I felt peaceful. When I quickly dropped off a roof into the next scene, I felt tense.
Yet, when a character in the experience came up to me while I was at the bedside of this dying person, they said “You should have called me sooner! They are in a really bad state.” I had no reaction. I didn’t buy into their story that I should feel guilt over not calling them. There wasn’t even an option in the game to do so.
My point is, some of these feelings I fell for. I was genuinely (positively) affected by the nature, I was genuinely (negatively) scared by the fall, and I was unaffected by the guilt. But everyone might feel these things differently to varying degrees.
It is my hypothesis that we will feel things more strongly if they are emotionally close to something we recognize. I recognize nature, I recognize the sensation of falling, but I was not in the emotional vicinity of taking on guilt from a virtual person that I just “met”.
Falling for images is based on our belief system. If we see the world as a mostly trustworthy place, we may fall for scam images meant to elicit a sympathetic response. If we are angry toward the world, then images that trigger this will get a bigger response from us than from a person who is mostly peaceful and content in their life.
Messy Bun Book Lover
(Originally posted on May 1, 2025)
If you like Roy Lichtenstein, I highly recommend this book: Roy Lichtenstein by Klaus Albrecht Schröder, Gunhild Bauer
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