The Art of Generative Narrativity

Recent advancements in generative artificial intelligence (generative AI) technologies have transformed the computer science discipline of natural language processing. However, generative AI retains the anthropomorphic model of simulating human narrative construction and verbal communication whereas, for artists, the ideational exploration is often more important than human mimicry or even plausibility in storytelling. It sometimes leads to generative experiments with non-verbal forms or events that have the potential to incite narratives through the audience’s experience of the works’ functionalities, backgrounds, and contexts. In this paper, we focus on such artistic approaches to narrativity. In five central sections, we discuss interrelated exemplars whose conceptual frameworks, methodologies, and other attributes anticipate or underscore the issues of contemporary linguistic automation based on massive datafication and statistical retrospection. In closing sections, we summarize the expressive features of these exemplars and underline their value for critically assessing generative AI’s cultural influence and fallouts.