Here's an Example of What Google's Gemini 2.5 AI Can Do

Over the past few years I have experimented a bt with various AI graphics programs and writing programs. I thought it my be fun to share some images showing what Google's Gemini AI can do (version 2.5 Flash)

Most of my pantings begin with a background. Backgrounds vary based on intentions. Some are very intentional while many are exploratory, in which I let the brushwork dictate the direction the painting goes. This is a medium sized canvas, 24"x 36". I began with these brushstrokes and colors, unsure where it would take me. A few years ago when I visited the studio of abstract painter Elizabeth Kuth, I saw how she would paint in layers, periodically rotating the canvas 180 degrees, bringing new elements into view, which she would highlight or bury beneath more visual elements. After a few rotations and layers I painted the following incomplete form of a man. Unsure of where to go with it, this has been siting on one of my easels since late last fall.

Last night I shared the above image with Gemini and 

asked that the AI to paint Vincent Van Gogh's face on my 

incomplete piece. Two minutes later I had the following,

which jumps fromthe canvas while retaining 

the original abstract aspects.

It's a collaboration.

This second sequence shows a common technique I had used for years. As anyone knows who knows me I am fascinated by faces and have been drawing them since  pre-school. 20 years ago or so, I began using Photoshop to break faces into contrasting patterms of light and dark.

I used to draw high contrast faces in high school. I loved the way the contrast would amplify the features while simultantously simplifying the elements. You can see how this works here on the cover of Meet the Beatles.

So I took my original painting and fed it to Gemini. [Gemini is a family of multimodal large language models (LLMs) developed by Google AI that can understand and operate across different types of information, including text, code, audio, image, and video.]  My prompt was: Paint this woman in the style of Rembrandt but in this color scheme. Have the face itself emulate that of Marlene Dietrich.

This was the result.

My next prompt was:

Change the background to a Dutch interior 

from the time period of Vermeer.

My final prompt was:

Change the background to be a starry night 

in the style of Van Gogh.

 Each image took less than two minutes to generate.

To try it yourself, go to https://gemini.google.com/

Press the little + symbol to upload an image and 

write an instruction prompt for Gemini to work on.

Artist Melissa D Johnston Revisited

Expansion

I discovered Melissa Johnston through an online art community six or seven years ago. At the time I was struck by her Visual Poetry (VisPo) and the spirit of her work. As a result I interviewed her here in February 2010. A month or two ago some of her recent work that I had been seing on Twitter caught my eye and I decided it would be good time to do a follow-up.

EN: It’s fascinating where your Visual Poetry explorations have taken you. Much of your current work combines photographic imagery with digital collage. What would you call what you are doing now?

Melissa D. Johnston: The umbrella classification for my work would be “digital art,” which technically would cover what I do with digital collage, digital painting, and photo manipulation, whether done with a camera, Photoshop, or an iPhone. In that, the designation isn’t different (in terms of media) from what I did and do with VisPo. The difference now is that all of my images are my own photography (in the beginning with VisPo I used stock photography for collages) and some of my works are more focused on and bring out the photographic aspect of the works.

Crumble

EN: Your work makes an emotional and evocative connection that draws viewers in. How do you determine your subject matter?

MDJ: Thank you very much. In many ways I feel like my subject matter chooses me and not the other way around. Almost everything starts with photography now in terms of artistic process, and so many of these shots are serendipitous. I’ll be out somewhere (or maybe even in my own backyard) and something strikes me with its intrigue, beauty, or maybe even with a difference that could be registered as ugliness but I find very attractive. I’ll begin taking shots and before I know it I have 100 or 200 (or sometimes many more) of not just that particular thing but all the other things around me that I’m now able to see in a way I couldn’t before. Inevitably these incidents produce at least one photograph that proves integral later to a work. Maybe not that day or even three months later. But sometime in the future I’ll be scrolling through my photographs and one will beckon me and I’m off—making it the foundation for a new piece. In a way the process of taking photos and creating digital collage are the same in terms of intuition and feeling. All of my shots are very intuitive, as is the process of building a larger piece that brings in many more images.

Muse

EN: You seem extremely prolific. Can you identify what is driving you?

MDJ: Thank you. I don’t feel very prolific a lot of times and I definitely go in and out of periods of productivity. I’d never really thought of myself as being “driven” in regard to art. It’s one of the few things that in and of itself calms me down and actually gives me energy, not take it away—even when I’m frustrated as hell with a piece. This is true both with photography and with the creation of digital art. But lately, in working on a show I have coming up, I’ve realized there really is something deeper directing some of the pieces, if not the pursuit in general. I believe that art taps into the unconscious and I also believe that creativity is healing in and of itself. This gives a chance for the silenced parts of me (most of whom were silenced through trauma) to speak. The creation of art is an act of attention on my part—a listening that makes space for those formerly silenced voices and makes space for a dialogue with them, one that seems easiest for me to access through art. The latest series I’ve been working on, “Eternal Childhood,” very much seems to be directed by a dialogue with the formerly silenced parts of myself.

Solitary

EN: Have you been showing your work locally somewhere? Any upcoming shows?

MDJ: Yes! I have been showing locally (and elsewhere) for some time, but I have my first solo show, called “Story” opening soon—Tuesday, November 17—at Old Town Public House in Cornelius, NC. The main works for the show are from the “Eternal Childhood” series. These pieces feature children in fantastical or dreamlike scenarios and/or places. Each work is paired with a very short fairy tale/fable I’ve written. At the opening and the two other receptions we’ve planned, these images and stories are woven together chronologically by my personal account of the journey of healing childhood trauma. So these receptions are part art exhibition, part reading, and part artist talk—but all story, highlighting different stages and aspects of my own personal story at each reception.

* * * *

Visit Melissa D. Johnston's Instagram page.
Visit her Flickr collection here.
Here is a link to her website: http://melissadjohnston.com/

The Door

Meantime, art goes on all around you. Engage it.

Wordless Wednesday: Beginning in the Red Zone

And ending in the Twilight Zone.

This set had as its origin an image by John Heino at Red Interactive, 

an international collaborative Facebook project.

 

Reshaping Reality: Ten MInutes with Visual Artist Conal Flaherty

I "met" Conal Flaherty through social media, like so many writers and artists today. Though from England, his path and work, while different from my own, has some similar qualities. In his youth he was an art student, a painter, but went on to make a living outside the arts, returning only later in life to his art roots. In the return he began to incorporate contemporary technologies into his creative expression like many other artists have done. Ultimately, Flaherty's explorations have led to visually compelling images such as those you see on this page. Here is his story.

Ennyman: How did you get interested in Art?
Conal Flaherty: Whilst I don’t recall too much from my early years schooling I do remember my very first day at school at the tender age of five. The year was 1958. I wasn’t too sure where I was going when my Mother walked away and left me with some stranger who took me into a large room with other similarly aged children. To say I wasn’t happy was an understatement, tears flowed I guess I thought I was there for good, I was given a pencil and some crayons that kept me quiet for a few years!
I can trace all of my creativity back to that day and a few teachers along the way who told me that my work was ‘good’. The same was never said for Mathematics or the Science subjects, neither did I shine at anything too technical, just let me be creative and I was happy.

E: Early Influences?
CF: Mondrian stands out. I remember seeing a picture of his in a book at school when I was in my teens. I loved the line and the colour, still do for that matter. Academically I was always okay without excelling in any chosen subject. As for Art I was usually in the top five kids in my year.

When I was fourteen my Father died. From there on in my upbringing was the sole domain of my Mother and my Aunt both of whom were supportive of my art work. At the age of seventeen it seemed that the best opportunity for me would be to attend the local Art College, get some qualifications behind me, extend my skills and go on to do a Degree in Art.

The local School of Art in Warrington was where I learned the most, it was here that I started to follow Dadaism and Marcel Duchamp. I particularly liked Marcel Duchamp’s ‘Large Glass.’ The glass had cracked whilst being transported home following its first exhibition. Duchamp kept the cracks in the glass, accepting the chance element as part of the piece, for some reason the ‘chance element’ resonated with me and continues to do so. The opportunity presented itself for me to go and study further at Goldsmiths College in London. I had sent my work to them and they wanted to interview me. For whatever reason I didn’t get through that interview. I don’t really know why, too young, immature perhaps, who knows? For then at least it was a chance and a chance that was lost.

E: One door closes...
CF: What followed was life, marriage, divorce, occasionally picking up a sketching book but always bringing an element of creativity to whatever job I was in. Work was predominantly Training & Development, Motivational Training, and those kinds of things. In 2002 I re-married. I had no children in my first marriage and now through work I met Christine who similarly had no children. And so it was in 2004 that my wife who on finding it difficult to find a picture to give to a friend for a Birthday present turned to me and asked whether I could paint something?
The excuses came free flowing. I didn’t have the paint, or the paper or the easel or the studio or this or that. She’s a bit persistent my wife. I say that with a wry smile. She’s good for me. She pushes me and she didn’t let up.

It’s a longer story but I started looking at what software came with the PC and basically just started playing around with it, finally producing something that looked good in a presentation frame. The gift sparked an immediate response with the recipient who wanted to know where she might buy more of the prints, and so it began.

By 2005 I was much more engaged in the process. Of course the images were abstract and fitted so perfectly into the ‘chance element’ under the influence of my old friend Marcel Duchamp.

E: Digital what?
CF: I take a digital photograph; it could be of anything, a holiday snap even. I then edit it, cutting and stretching the image, sometimes the colours change automatically, other times I change them.

I don’t set out with an end view. There’s nothing pre-determined. In fact, I’m no expert with the various editions of software that I use. It’s more that I allow them to reveal something entirely new. Many of the images I discard completely though some of them have such complexities of line and colour that I prefer to keep them for a time when I may use them again.

The final decision sits with me. I decide when something is finished, when it’s complete, and of course I enquire of my wife for her thoughts. Interestingly enough I completed a commission for a customer recently and I ended up showing him images that I was about to dispose of. He chose one and it now sits proudly on his wall. As they say there’s no accounting for taste!

E: Presentation...
CF: During the early years I printed the images myself before learning that certain inks just don’t last so now images go off to the printers. They can be printed either onto canvas and hung or printed onto archival paper and framed. The choice is with the customer. All the inks used are Archival also which means that the image remains light resistant for up to 75 years. Not that I’ll be around if it’s one or two years out. I’m keen to explore printing onto Perspex and perhaps using a Light Box.

E: Back to the future... What's next?
CF: I’ve done a remarkable thing. I’ve taken the chance and resigned from my job to take up a full time career as an artist. That was six months ago now. So here I am in my studio/office typing away for an article on a fellow artist blog in Minnesota. You read my bio on my own website www.conalart.com where I say that I’m going to start painting again, painting what?
You know when I was eighteen I just produced work after work in mixed media, paintings, drawings, pottery, carvings, prints and so on and now I realise I’ve been limiting myself. I’ve got ten canvas’s just waiting for me to start painting. Bizarrely I’ve had a dream about what to paint. There’s going to be an influence of Mondrian this time, that is if I remembered the dream. Some other goofy stuff, but I think we’ll keep that away from the canvas for now and leave it firmly fixed in my head.

You can follow me on Twitter @Conalart and become a fan of my Facebook Fan page here at http://www.facebook.com/ArtyCon As soon as the first painting is complete I’ll post to my website, keep in touch.

Thank you Conal. We'll be watching to see what happens next.