Where the belief meets a real question.

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No single voice answers here — that’s deliberate. Questions from artists, residency alumni and sector peers are worked through collectively by the company, the same way a Polyphonic performance holds many voices without letting one dominate. Signed simply: — IJAD.

“An AI tool can now generate a passable version of my choreographic style in seconds. I don’t know whether to feel flattered, threatened, or like I should just stop making work in that style altogether. How do I think about this?”

This question comes up more than any other right now, in almost this exact shape. A few things worth separating: speed is not the same as understanding. A generative tool can reproduce a surface pattern without any of the embodied history, risk, or relational context that produced it in the first place — which is a different thing from replacing it.

The more useful question isn’t “can it copy my style,” but “what does my style mean when a room full of people are physically present to it, versus when it’s rendered on a screen with no body behind it.” That gap is not a threat to defend against. It’s the actual subject of the work now. Several artists in the current OOT Residency are building pieces directly out of that gap rather than around it.

— IJAD