Liminality

This body of work draws inspiration from artist Emi Kusano’s childhood dream journals, the dazzling contrasts of early 2000s pop culture, video games, and myths from across time and around the world. The resulting series vividly depicts a surreal world that transcends conventional boundaries. The unexpected, fantastical images created through collaboration with AI evoke nostalgia and reminiscence in viewers.

Employing her own AI processing technique, these collage-like AI photographs emerge from repeated adjustments of noise reduction "sampling steps" and re-upscaling processes. The images explore the ambiguous realm where dreams and reality intersect. Through the transformation of reality perception brought about by AI, a new world of perception comes to life, inhabited by ever-changing, amorphous landscapes and fluid human figures.

The collection arises from Kusano's aesthetic vision, which continually explores the interplay between AI-generated visuals and fragments of human recollection. Incorporating elements of surrealism and automatism, it reflects the artist's unique creative process and inner world. Through dialogue with AI, Kusano woven from unexpected creativity, pursuing new possibilities in artistic expression woven from memory and technology.