GENAGRAPH: A Manifesto for a New Era of Image-Making
I. PROLOGUE: LIGHT, MEMORY, METHOD
I was looking at an image not long ago and found myself asking a simple question: What is this?
Is it a photograph? A digitally manipulated file? A rendering? A collage?
Or is it something else entirely?
That question didn’t just linger—it provoked something. It stirred both my intellectual and artistic curiosity. I couldn't let it go.
As a photographer, I am trained to see and chase light.
First through the lens. Then watching it find its way onto walls, screens, storyboards, campaigns, and culture.
I’ve always loved the process of making—more than the final result.
The geometry of light, subject, and framing…creating a moment where the insignificant becomes significant.
And I still believe the pursuit of the photographic image is sacred. But something is shifting. And this transcends the simple fact that the tools are changing.
AI challenges the very idea that I need a camera in order to make a picture.
We say things like, “I made this in Midjourney.”
We associate the provenance of the image with the tool used to make it, as if the outcome is less meaningful because of the method. We explain the image by apologizing for the process.
Because the form has outgrown the container of its name.
This is no longer just “digital art” or “AI-generated content.”
This is something else entirely.
A fully metastasized, fully expressive creative discipline.
One that deserves its own space, its own scrutiny, its own name.
So I gave it one.
Genagraph
n. / JEN-A-GRAPH /
Borne from “generate” and “graph.”
"Graph"—from the Greek graphein, meaning to write, to draw, to mark, to record.
Not a tool.
A new category of image-making.
An active process.
One that requires a unique dialogue between the artist and the tool.
Where imagination is the instrument, and thought is the shutter.
A discipline born from prompts, but powered by mastery.
A shorter path to an outcome—not better, just different.
But no less worthy of critical eyes, creative rigor, or artistic respect.
While I may have coined it. And trademarked it.
I don’t own it.
Like art after it’s published, it belongs to the culture now.
II. THE LEXICON IS BROKEN
We are now creating images that no longer fit the existing categories we’ve inherited.
We call them "AI-generated images." We over-explain. We disclaim. We diminish.
These phrases aren’t descriptors. They’re defenses.
Like my friend and mentor Rishad Tobaccowala always says: "The future does not fit into the containers of the past."
Because these aren’t simply digital renders or algorithmic illustrations. They’re the products of human vision, computational power, and linguistic precision. They’re composed through prompts, not lenses; and shaped by taste, training, and timing.
They are not lesser forms. They are different forms.
And they need a name.
III. ON NAMING
While it is a part—naming, in and of itself, doesn’t fully encompass branding.
But it’s where meaning begins.
We name things to claim space for them—to give them clarity, legitimacy, and room to grow.
And so I offer a name:
GENAGRAPH
A Genagraph is an image created through the intentional use of AI tools and prompts. It is the product of human intention, aesthetic judgment, and machine collaboration. It is not defined by the specific tool used, but by the form and process itself. Humans + AI creating imagery, together.
IV. NOT BETTER, JUST DIFFERENT
Let’s be clear: this is not about replacing photography, illustration, CGI, or design.
It is about recognizing a new discipline that sits adjacent to them.
Where photography is a hunt, Genagraphs are a conjuring.
Where traditional workflows rely on devices, lighting rigs, and physical scenes, Genagraphs are created through dialogue—between maker and machine, between imagination and realization.
Where the subject isn’t physical, and the role of space and light disappears.
If photography is the intentional, pre-visualized, scenic road to a final image—where you can see what you’re going to capture through the viewfinder—there is no viewfinder in a Genagraph. Only the result.
V. A CALL TO CRAFT
Like any medium, Genagraphs can be abused.
Templates. Laziness. Style over substance. Rewarded mediocrity. Likes above all else.
But my hope, is that the best will come from people who understand composition, tension, narrative, color, proportion. From those who know the rules of visual storytelling—because they’ve broken them a thousand times before.
You can’t prompt your way into greatness without understanding where greatness comes from.
A Genagraph is not a lucky accident. It is a deliberate creation.
VI. WHAT THIS IS (AND ISN’T)
Genagraph is not a platform.
It is not a startup.
It is not an app.
It is a word. A container. A way of thinking.
It invites critique, interpretation, exploration.
It gives cultural and creative weight to a practice already underway.
And yes, I coined it. I trademarked it. I secured the domain.
Not to own it—but to offer it, clean and unclaimed.
Let the artists, critics, collectors, and theorists do the rest.
VII. THE ERA BEGINS
We need new language to match this moment.
Not just to describe what we’re doing—but to understand what it means. Or associate it with the tool of its origin.
Genagraph is the start of that language.
It’s time to take it seriously.
To teach it.
To challenge it.
To make something unforgettable with it.
Written by Scott Witt
Founder, Parlance
