The Power of Imagination
(March 28, 2024)
The Power of Imagination (March 28, 2024)
I enjoy drawing comic stories although I haven’t had any formal training for any form of graphic arts. None the less, I take it as a success if I can convince you that the following illustration is a sketch of a cat;
Then, could you tell me what the following illustration represents?
Oui, c’est un serpent boa qui digérait un éléphant.
Of course, for anyone who wants to draw, it’s better to have artistic ability to illustrate. But I believe the ability to invoke people’s imagination is also important. The pilot in Le Petit Prince (1943), when he was six years old, asked the above question to adults around him. People lose imagination as they grow up. So does the pilot until he meets the little prince.
Thornton Wilder’s Our Town (1938) is a fix for high school stage play. The stage does not need many things. At the minimum setting, a few chairs and a table may be enough to convince viewers to see events in a small-town America at the dawn of 20th century. Good acting invokes viewers’ imagination.
Another example; I’m a huge Rakugo fan. Rakugo is Japanese performance art established centuries ago. Typically, a Rakugo performer (Hanashika) tells funny stories on stage. All what he/she needs is a Sensu (folding fan) and a handkerchief. Using only these two items, a good hanashika can invoke viewers’ imagination to see characters in the story, their fortune and misfortune, joy, sorrow, agony, fury, and all sorts of emotions in daily life.
The progress of VFX technology in the past few decades is amazing. In “how they made it?” videos, we see actors in costume (of the past, the present, or the future) in front of a blue-colored screen, The final outcome is actions in spectacular worlds, real or imaginary. Soon, real actors will be replaced with AI-generated actors. Scientists predict the jobs that will disappear in the next decades. Do the lists include actors? For me, the more important question is if the future movies can invoke our imagination.
Some forms of arts are already created by AIs. George Orwel predicted that in the future, AI composes popular songs in a world ceaseless fires go on everywhere. I truly hope our world won’t be like that.
* Wilder, Thornton, Our Town (1938).
* Saint-Exupéry, Antoine de, Le Petit Prince (1943).
* Orwell, George, 1984 (1949).
