Hacking Victorian Bodies: From Grid to Vector Space - AI and Historical Body Representations

Explore a 37-minute performative lecture where SOLID FLESH Collective investigates the intersection of Victorian-era chronophotography and modern generative AI to reimagine bodily representation. Learn how Muybridge's grid-based scientific documentation of human bodies can be transformed through AI into fluid, multidimensional expressions of embodiment. Discover the technical and artistic process of 'resurrecting' Victorian subjects using open-source AI tools, including custom ComfyUI workflows, while examining how AI censorship of historical images led to the creation of surreal, inhuman movements through animDiff. Delve into the concept of the 'vector body' - a digitally-mediated form that spans dimensions of gender, age, and class - and understand its potential for breaking free from conventional body ideals. Examine how embracing AI's glitches and 'failures' can lead to alternative futures of algorithmic embodiment and identity fluidity, challenging mainstream AI's reinforcement of traditional body standards.