Six Critical Lenses on AI-Generated Images
CRC Press (2026), xvii, 176 pp.
"This book offers six critical, interdisciplinary approaches to AI-generated images. It invites the reader to (re-)imagine relationships between artefacts and media, authorship and agency, creativity and commodification, representation, and visual style. Across the chapters, the book examines three realities of AI images, from sociotechnical fabrics, through semiotic interfaces, to representations and aesthetics. Drawing on media studies, philosophy of technology, multimodality studies, critical AI studies, and visual communication studies, the book pursues the following interconnected topics: (1) addressing pataphysical and sociomaterial engagements with AI image making, (2) theorizing distributed and probabilistic forms of agency through the concept of vector agency, (3) analysing interfaces and affordances of visual generative AI via multimodal walkthroughs, (4) conceptualising prompting as a cultural practice that reshapes agency, (5) mapping representational patterns and emerging visual genres in AI-generated imagery, and (6) interrogating how visual AI styles are co-produced by machines, users, and generative platform politics. These six critical lenses offer complementary perspectives to understanding the complex ecosystem surrounding AI image production." (Publisher description)
Introduction: Making Sense of AI-Generated Images / Nataliia Laba and Catherine Bouko, 1
1 On Pataphysical Engagements with GenAI Image Making and Their Sociomaterial Trade-Offs / Suneel Jethani, 25
2 On Vector Agency / Emanuele Arielli, 48
3 On Exploring the Visual Grounds and Affordances of AI-Generated Images Through Multimodal Walkthroughs / Daniel Pfurtscheller and Katharina Christ, 72
4 On Prompting as a Cultural Practice in Visual Generative AI / Craig Johnson and Rowan Tulloch, 100
5 On Representations and Emerging Genres of AI-Generated Images / Katharina Lobinger, 120
6 On Machines, Users, and the Politics of Visual Style in AI-Generated Images / T.J. Thomson, Catherine Bouko, Nataliia Laba, and Janina Wildfeuer, 146
1 On Pataphysical Engagements with GenAI Image Making and Their Sociomaterial Trade-Offs / Suneel Jethani, 25
2 On Vector Agency / Emanuele Arielli, 48
3 On Exploring the Visual Grounds and Affordances of AI-Generated Images Through Multimodal Walkthroughs / Daniel Pfurtscheller and Katharina Christ, 72
4 On Prompting as a Cultural Practice in Visual Generative AI / Craig Johnson and Rowan Tulloch, 100
5 On Representations and Emerging Genres of AI-Generated Images / Katharina Lobinger, 120
6 On Machines, Users, and the Politics of Visual Style in AI-Generated Images / T.J. Thomson, Catherine Bouko, Nataliia Laba, and Janina Wildfeuer, 146