Pelican Stairs: A Wapping Great Pandemic Memoir

Research output: Non-textual formArtefact

Abstract / Description of output

Pelican Stairs is a multimedia AI-assisted pandemic memoir started during the depths of Covid-19 lockdown in 2020. I took photos of my local neighbourhood, Wapping in London, on my daily walks between March and September. I often visited the Thames shore area by climbing a set of steps known as Pelican Stairs. Using those photos as a training set, I generated new images with a Generative Adversarial Network (GAN), which I paired with excerpts from my diary during the same period. The unsettling, almost-real images contrasted with the mundane reality of the diary entries allow the viewer to viscerally (re)experience the inherent tension between an increasingly uncertain external reality and internal attempts at control or sense-making through normal, everyday habits. The project is hosted at https://pelicanstairs.art.
Original languageEnglish
Publication statusPublished - 13 Sept 2021

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  • Pelican Stairs: A Wapping Great Pandemic Memoir

    McDonald, C., Jun 2022, C&C '22: Proceedings of the 14th Creativity and Cognition 2022. ACM, p. 663-665 3 p.

    Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contribution

  • Pelican Stairs: A Wapping Great Pandemic Memoir

    McDonald, C., 15 Nov 2021, XXIV Generative Art 2021: Proceedings of XXIV GA Conference. Soddu, C. & Colabella, E. (eds.). Rome: Domus Argenia, p. 461-464 4 p.

    Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contribution

    Open Access

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