ANIMAFEST PRO | ANIMAFEST SCANNER XII | PANEL 1: ISTRAŽIVANJE ANIMACIJE I EFEMERNOG U FILMU

Using AI for Animation Historiography: A Speculative Visual Index - AURÉLIE PETIT

PANEL 1 - ISTRAŽIVANJE ANIMACIJE I EFEMERNOG U FILMU
03/06 UTO 11:35-12:05 KIC

A Speculative Visual Index is a research-driven exploration that revisits the lost animated film Black Pudding (1969) by Nancy Edell, a pioneer in feminist animation. Made in the late 1960s during her studies at Bristol University (UK), Black Pudding is one the oldest known animated representations of sexual imagery by a woman. It was made ten years before Asparagus (Suzan Pitt, 1979), often cited as an early example of feminist explicit animation. Although at the time of its release, many adult-oriented animated films were produced across Europe, many of them are now considered lost. Likewise, Black Pudding is considered a lost media as copies of the film are no longer available, exemplifying the lack of film preservation for 1) adult animated films, 2) feminist media made by women, and 3) experimental films that exist outside of traditional film institutions. While we do not have access to Black Pudding today, many did in the past. Thanks to this, we know at least some information about the film such as short summaries and descriptions by academics and film critics. The purpose of Black Pudding: A Speculative Visual Index is to create a platform that 1) highlights the existence of Black Pudding as a foundational feminist animated media, 2) makes accessible resources and literature about the film, and 3) creates a speculative visual index to interrogate the limits and potentials of Generative AI to restore, build, recover lost feminist media. The “disappearance” of Black Pudding is the method to explore both the (un)history of pornographic animation and the new creative AI tools seizing its industry. This project takes those surviving textual media as prompts to investigate the ethical and creative boundaries of generative AI in recreating feminist sexual representations: how would contemporary AI porn content-generators represent Black Pudding in 2024?

Aurélie Petit is a PhD Candidate in the Film Studies department at Concordia University, Montréal. She specializes in the intersection of technology and animation, with a focus on gender and sexuality. As a visual and social researcher, she researches the ethics of non-realistic visual sex media. She is the current Guest Editor of Porn Studies' special issue on Artificial Intelligence, Pornography, and Sex Work. Before that, she was a Doctoral Fellow in AI and Inclusion at the AI + Society Initiative (University of Ottawa) and a PhD research intern at the Social Media Collective (Microsoft Research). Website: www.aurelie-petit.com