The swagged-out pope is an AI fake — and an early glimpse of a new reality – The Verge
Let’s call this style hyperrealism. First, because it’s the adjective often used in text prompts to generate such pictures, and second, because it links the aesthetic to Jean Baudrillard’s concept of the hyperreal — a culture in which simulations displace reality. Hyperrealism in the context of AI images is an aesthetic defined by perfect lighting and glossy surfaces, by dramatic poses and saturated colors. It’s stylized and exaggerated — the sort of image we already associate with celebrities, whose likenesses are reproduced with such abundance and deliberation that they often already look fake.