Last Friday, myself, Nicolas Cevallos, and mar vallverdú had a little salon to untangle what slop really is, all on the occasion of the launch of Culture Slop. Held at Barcelona’s Terranova book shop, we chatted for about thirty minutes on the subject and about the magazine. It was super cute!
Also? It was a trilingual affair. I gave the introduction in Spanish and then we bounced around in the languages we were most comfortable in, myself in English, Nico in Spanish, and Mar in Catalan. The result was a multi-tiered conversation that is very anti-slop in that it really requires one’s own thinking to have enjoyed and understood. It was great!
Two catches though! First, I forgot to start recording the conversation when it started and — second — translating it into one language (English!) was a challenge. Apologies for any confusions below, but I think I’ve approximated the ideas to the best of my abilities. Either way: enjoy! You can order a free issue of Culture Slop here too.
Transcription below, in English, via Otter. With help from Google Translate and Vook.AI. All to say: apologies for any confusions, inaccuracies, etc. as this was the best I could do by myself lol
NICO CEVALLOS: These are images of perfect dishes, but the real thing for me is what we don’t realize and accept, whether as images or text, but also as thought. When we start developing thought with machines, our thinking becomes very derivative, you know.
MAR VALLVERDU: I’ll speak in Catalan, in case you were missing a language. Let’s do the first... and before eating with my boyfriend I told him I was coming here to talk about this and that we would talk about the slop and he said, “But what is it?” to have an idea before coming to the talk, and I was like…how do I explain what slop is? I mean, for me it’s an obvious thing and of course, I was looking for a word in Catalan to translate it and now I was thinking, I think the word is “barroer” — meaning it’s like badly made — it’s like, for example, I think a bit like what Kai was saying, there’s like a clear mood board and then there’s a will for mass production, I mean, there’s an idea that we know works and then it has to be exploited and then we mass produce it. And it can be in any field. I need to start giving examples of slop already, like, what’s most recent or what has hit hardest here in Barcelona is the Paloma Wool slop, which are these brands that follow the Paloma Wool formula and then do the slop of this type of clothing because they know there is this target audience; and so instead of understanding that what they see in Paloma Wool is this original idea and that it’s a special being, it’s like, ‘no, it’s exactly this color’. And when the first slop of Paloma Wool came out it was like Shein during the pandemic, which was all like — sure, we’ve been like psychedelic and then we did the slop of this formula which was like, ‘no, the vibe of Paloma Wool wasn’t that it was specifically psychedelic’ but like this ‘special’ idea. So slop is that: not quite understanding what is working and copying it very literally and doing something barroer. And then also like I heard people saying things like A24 slop, which is like copying the idea of those movies that are ‘indie’; and so it’s like ‘okay, yeah, it’s exactly that’, and they copy very literally. And now a scene from a series comes to mind, please, please, if there’s something to work on there... but I feel like sometimes, for example, the series The Bear, I think it has a lot to do with the idea that the acceleration between idea and result makes copying results without the process very easy.”
NC: And I think it has a lot to do with the idea of the acceleration between idea and result. It makes copying results without the process very easy, so that makes it very easy to copy. It’s the hard part to realize because you haven’t had a process of realizing that the best isn’t the best in a project, as the final result is what you want because you want the impact, and the more impact is generated, the less impact it has because suddenly everything is like a fluorescent green and you don’t want to see it anymore because you realize that suddenly everyone is going with this same thing, it’s not even aesthetically because it’s like the mixing, it has something very memetic in that it becomes memetic and by losing and by becoming memetic, it loses a little of the intensity of that. It’s interesting that, as we already resolved, as the next question, which I thought was quite fun, to name “slop” before the slope, as how we have defined these things that we see even before the AI because I think there have always been things that don’t just have to do what they appear to be, this is when I’m thinking it would be worth it, and that’s something that’s a bit rough, but the value is half-believed, it came very much as a way of saying that something isn’t worth it because it’s not fully formed, it’s not strong enough, but how it has been mixed.
KYLE RAYMOND FITZPATRICK: Derivative? I mean, this is something that you were saying. You both were saying is that like it. You know, the idea of slop is that it’s giving you the end product without the work, obviously. And I think that that was something that had existed before AI in a lot of ways. I think that’s you know not to be mean or rude, but I think a lot of say mainstream culture, a lot of mainstream movies, music, things like that are in a way slop because like it is, you know. I think the Charli example is a really good example because like when you when Charlie XCX obviously when she did Brat and then you saw Camila Cabello, Katy Perry — who else? There were a few other people who did it, and like it wasn’t the same because like it wasn’t an original idea, or like it was sort of forced an aesthetic versus a mindset or a process to what you were saying, and like I think that that is even it’s funny because like those existed during AI, but like they were not AI. That is sort of something that we have seen throughout at least modern history. I don’t know in the whole of art history if that is true, but I think that that is definitely something like, you know, when you think about movies in the ‘90s that were sort of echoing each other, or like you made another movie about a tornado because it was a successful movie about a tornado. Like that is in a way like spiritual slop.
NC: The time between the generation of different derivative things was much longer, so it felt like a moment, and everyone enjoyed joining in, not as a trend, but as a moment, embracing that we are all doing the same thing. Now it happens so fast that it cancels itself out in a short time.
MV: For me, a synonym for slop before artificial intelligence too. I mean, it’s not that it was the same, but the vibes, the ‘Better World’ cup, I mean, it would be uncanny valley. Camila Cabello’s album is a bit of an uncanny valley of Brat. I mean, if suddenly it occurred to you in your memory and you only have a vague memory, you’d say, ‘if this is true’, you’d say like, ‘something is off’. Like, maybe it is true, but something’s off. And I think it’s a bit like that idea….When I see slop, I think a bit of the word ‘uncanny’. Like, is there someone here who makes me understand that there isn’t the feeling that this has been made real? I mean, like, something is off.
NC: Uncanny valley —
Brief interruption as we reached capacity for the space.
KRF: To the uncanny valley…that reminds me. I recently saw with Cris and Bobby Aaron Solomon over there, and Cris mentioned this. is It reminds me like you know the Backrooms. Like if you saw Backrooms or you know about the idea of it, it is about this sort of like copy of a copy that almost looks like reality, but it’s not, or like it’s a little bit off. And I think that that is to that point. Like that has always existed, and like that is also why you have Janet Jackson being super successful, but then also Latoya Jackson being successful because she is. You know, it’s why you have Mario and Mario. It’s like it’s that thing. But now I think, and you were mentioning this is like a big difference is you were able to notice that there was a gap between going to market of like I have this idea it’s out here and then a year or two later a similar idea now it gets really muddy really fast because it’s like well this thing is out there and then like all of a sudden there are six other things and it’s like well who started this who was the original idea like did the original video actually include any anything generative?
NC: What you’re saying about uncanny valley has an example, which is all those expressions that are used a lot for something that seems to but isn’t, and it connects it directly with the slop because it’s what keeps trying to be better at making something seem human, okay, so now we all have to develop skills to determine that something that is written is something derivative but not debatable from a person and not like from a cloud or that something that is handmade is not handmade, which is becoming easier and easier, I think also lends itself to this part, like with the converts, like detectives of reality, so as to feel that we are not being fooled or as if we are interested in this not happening.
KRF: Really quickly: that reminded me it’s like I feel like the origins they would never admit this I think is like in the fashion industry of slop, really, because like you did have like fast fashion was exactly that, and that has existed since you know the late ‘90s, and like even before then, like a knockoff was that, and so that is it’s funny because like fashion would never admit that, but also ironically that’s why I think fashion loves using AI because like it’s giving them the same result in ways that they can sort of cut around people, or you know the same idea of like they made it in China, but it’s like well, this computer here that’s like fucking shit up.
MV: And when we were talking about slop and it was going around, suddenly I started thinking of a lot of examples of slop, like: A24 slop, Paloma Wool slop, those bars in Barcelona that are all like Folklore, whatever — Folklore bar slop. I thought how in the end we are talking so much about slop that it is slop-slop, like, “slop of the slop.” Everything starts like that and in the end too, they are these words that we incorporate like core used to be, right? Like, I don’t know, how do you say? In code it’s core or core core — or whatever. In the end, slop’ is derogatory, core is neutral, and maxing…would be the positive one. In the end, they are suffixes for things; depending on what seems more positive or negative to us, we apply it to the end of a word.
NC: Okay, to add another layer, and how it’s not now, like the word that has gone to “slop” to be spoken in a less academic way, but a bit like, a bit like, more serious people have joined this conversation that before was like internet freaks of “tasteslop,” that is, it’s when the slope helps to pretend that you have a complex or unique taste and this is what no longer has anything to do with the idea and at the same time has everything to do with the fact that you can accelerate many processes thanks to the idea and that more and more like cosmos and all these have things that help that without you realizing it, the things you produce are derivative because they work on derivative algorithms, but the taste slope has a lot to do with wanting to generate an image of yourself, of your company, of your project that you try to make, that the slopes that are tastefall but in reality are like a disguise again.
KRF: Like what you said earlier: the mood board. I think that that oftentimes, like if you’re not familiar with taste lab, like taste lab is this idea to me at least that you know to the Paloma wool thing is like I just buy all Paloma wool because someone told me it’s nice and that’s all I wear. It’s all I buy. That’s sort of taste lop. Someone told you what to do, you do it. And oftentimes, like the the memes at least about taste lop are the, you know, maybe the late 2010s, early 2020s mood board, like the white with like all the items on it. That has now become a gesture of taste lop. I think people are saying that sort of like well, I can just add it all to my cart and then get it, and that I think is a bot identity versus something that you. I mean, everything that we said is like versus embarking on that quest yourself to figure out who I am, what my taste is, all that sort of stuff. It’s been condensed into oh well, like AI can spit out this little mood board for me, and then I know what to buy. Which is like, for a lot of people, that’s really reassuring. Before like macro culture, that’s probably terrible. I think the other thing to that too is like something else that comes to mind as well is like taste and taste lop, and we talk about this a lot in the issue. Like a lot of the stories are about taste, or kind of interrogating it and talking to tech people about it, and they have really silly views about it. And it the thing about the taste conversation and taste lab, as it relates to AI, is that like having someone from Palantir, OpenAI, telling you like what taste is, or trying to dictate what taste is, is just another form of like a sales tactic to then sell you a way of thinking, which is then like, well, then we can say, okay, like we think that this type, like these Birkenstocks, are the best, the only thing you should get, but then like it’s a very slippery slope, then to go from like that to then like well this race is the best race. So it’s like there it’s clearly we know that those things are a part of the tech conversation, and I think that that is like taste slop is like a very small drop in that larger puddle that’s building.
NC: There’s something about tasteslop that has to do with optimization, which is what people in tech are looking for. There have always been entrepreneurs who have tasteful friends because they buy art and have friends who are artists. That’s always been the case, but they didn’t want to be artists themselves. Now they do, and now they think they can be tech entrepreneurs, enthusiasts, and artists all at the same time because that’s what society demands. And now they use everything that allows them to present themselves in this way, like this mix, being able to invest in resources and money to create structures that disseminate more tasteslop.
MV: For me what... I mean, the conclusion I've brought from tasteslop follows a mood board, and this mood board in theory came to us from what we liked; and it’s that evidently taste—this shows that taste as a concept implies a part of gatekeeping, that there is a secret part, a part that not everyone can understand. So when it is dissectible, when it can be repeated en masse and mass-produced, it loses this part of taste. So evidently we can say with certainty that taste is necessary and that there is a part.
KRF: We were talking about something similar earlier about like you know, people who are like, oh, I’m a creative now, I can use AI, and it’s like, well, that is missing the point. Is like, it is again about that process of like again, that’s a really good point about the mood board. Is like, in the old days, or when you’re watching a movie from the ‘90s and someone was like cutting out pictures from a magazine and literally putting it on a board, like that process of being like, I like this. Why do I like this? Why do I want to put it on my idea of myself? Is very different than well, I really want to look minimalist, and then a machine tells me what minimalism is. Like that is, it’s not the result. It’s just an esthetic. It’s an esthetic, like was said earlier, but like that is happening increasingly, like taste lab as lifestyle or mentality of like, oh, like well, I can make art, like I’m an artist too, and it’s like, well, no, you are, you work in tech, like
NC: Or you want to be an artist, you can be an artist, but it might take ten years to get to a place where it’s worthwhile, and time is necessary for it to make sense and for it to be something you can carry over into a fifty-year career. I think another thing we were discussing with Kyle is that even the best way to use some of these tools or aids, the aids, the dosas as an aid for yourself, I think if you don’t build something real, you can’t generate a long career with that. You might generate peaks for a while, but you can’t generate something that grows and evolves because it’s not something that’s gestating inside us. Perhaps so that they don’t die, we’re going to go to the final part, which is to turn the situation around a bit, because there are also people who talk about slow optimism, but you might say, “What are they talking about all this time? They’re trying to defend that slope is something bad.” However, there are also people who are already theorizing that excessive slope also generates positive things in you, in how you reason about these things, but also in some way... A world where we feel that there are images devalues the image, and that’s not a positive thing, or that for many people who work in the visual field, it’s crazy that the image loses value, however, it generates the need for the image to be accompanied by a physical site, a space, a community. I think that’s the only silver lining of sloppy optimism. Let’s say that the excess of sloppy generates a certain culture that seeks to create things that are not capable of tasting sloppy themselves.
KRF: I mean it like look is there a silver lining I don’t know man but like I do think and this is this is great. It’s hard though. Is like for example, if you saw the the new trailer for the new Avengers movie, a lot of people are like, “This looks like soft. Like this looks like shit. It looks like every other fucking movie you’ve made, and that’s a reaction to them making the same movie for 15, almost 20 years, no more. Yeah, almost 20 years exactly. But also, it is because that style has been so embedded in like AI video production that like it looks like it looks like AI now. So like whether or not it is doesn’t matter. Is that like the esthetic is now AI slop. So that like presents a sort of I guess we can call it a slopdimistic point of view. Is that like in order to break through in any way in any sort of world? I think even outside of the creative world, like you really have to do the work of like being outside of the system and thinking really hard about like okay what is actually interesting. What is actually exciting or different, or less about that, but like actually doing something that is unique. And I think I’m only thinking about her because she did a perfectly imperfect this week. Is like a good example of someone like ML Buck. Like she reinvented how you think about and play the guitar, but like it’s a guitar. Like that has been around for centuries, and like at a moment when people are like, “That’s not exciting, she made it into this like warped, weird something that doesn’t even sound like a guitar. Like that’s a really good example, and that was born of her being like, “Well, I’m in the middle of fucking Denmark in a field, and like I’m just gonna stare at the sun and like get high off my guitar. Like then you end up with something like Sun Tub, but like that is, you know. Hopefully people will learn that lesson. I don’t think they will, but I think people like us, I hope, will learn that, and then we will hopefully bring better fruit to the table. It’ll be organic and beautiful. Yeah, exactly.
MV: I think that’s Kyle’s conclusion and, ultimately, that’s the driving force behind new artistic movements throughout the history of art and humanity. I mean, when we get tired of something, someone might say, for instance: ‘Cubism — wow, how wild!’ And suddenly a new movement begins; then, when we get really sick of that — like AI slop — someone will eventually come along who is interested enough (investing the effort, the years, and so on) to propose a new movement. One day, we’ll get fed up with the movement that emerged from this and say, ‘Screw it, let’s go back to AI slop’—or go back to doing other things. But hey, in the end, it’s a chain reaction that motivates us to do something different when we’re done with the current thing. I think humans get bored easily—and quickly—which is why we’re constantly creating new and interesting things.
NC: There are similar things with the AI that are like spirals; if you drown in that same spiral, you generate things that have never existed, like pregnant fruits, which is a new genre of drama that enslaves me to a thousand things at the same time, and it’s something that doesn’t have to have excessive cultural value, but the overall power that exists is co-created because it’s not by a single author, but rather it’s created through dissemination. And if I believe in the part, I optimize seeing a lot of people who will find communities of beginnings through being part of generating these new things that are co-created at the same time by these people, but more as an independent artistic movement and not so much as people generating the new movement that will move commercial products or underground cultures, which I believe will always try to follow other modes of operation.
KRF: I mean, yeah, I was to add to that is like another thing is like you know I am cringe, I’m free. Like I feel like that will be another sort of like counterbalance is to keep pushing that is like, if things are going to get more perfect and beautiful and whatever, then like that’s going to lose value and like it’s not interesting to the point of going away and cultivating yourself and your own ideas. Like that’s going to create a sort of economy and ideally a sort of counterbalance to that of people who are sort of, you know, a little bit more real, perhaps even technically quote unquote ugly as a sort of like cachet of like anti optimize, anti sort of like slopify that something is, you know, off in a sort of like refreshing way, and that will continue to I think, have a value. Unibrow, for example.
NC: We could keep talking about this, but you’re probably gonna die. So we’re gonna keep it short, so you can go outside and grab a little bit of air, and then we will bring a couple of drinks, so you can like refresh yourself. If you have any questions, you want to talk about anything you can reach. All of us, we will be here. Yeah, thank you so much for coming. And like having said that, if you live in the city and it can come later and you don’t need to take it like the magazine today.
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