Close Icon
Meta Icon

Dirk Habenschaden, in dialogue with ChatGPT
August 2025


back Gate Shop

Dance with the Devil — Creative Vision

Dance with the Devil is an artistic attempt to reflect on what it means to be human in an age of total measurability. The series shifts the focus to the risks we take when we surrender unquestioningly to the logic of optimization and convenience.

The Original Idea

It all began with a feeling: fear. It struck me as I delved deeper into the doctrines of transhumanism. For a long time, its advocates have held the conviction that human evolution must be technologically advanced — by enhancing body and mind, even overcoming the limits of mortality. This vision insists on a pact between nature and technology. And it raises urgent questions.

Where does the ungraspable, the divine within us, remain? What becomes of our creative force? Will our impulses, convictions, and opinions be reduced to data sets, managed by tech corporations and technocracies? Are we still human — or merely nodes in a network? Disembodied, predictable, controllable?

„Even science can give rise to new religions; it doesn’t require a god. The most intriguing place for this today is the Silicon Valley. It’s akin to ancient Rome in the days of early Christianity, where new religions are born in the minds of individuals. What is currently emerging could be termed a Techno-Religion.“

Yuval Harari

As early as 2023, I translated this fear into images in my series RED’n’BLUE. That was where my dialogue began with the question of how much humanity can remain within a technologized body.

Red'n'Blue

Works from the series RED’n’BLUE, 2023

Human – Code – Resistance

The theme never left me. In 2025, I picked up the thread again — with the question of what is at stake when we hand over our innermost selves, our doubts, hopes, and feelings, to algorithms.

I began by defining the emotional worlds that, for me, embody what it means to be human. Tenderness, for example, means attentiveness — to oneself, to the environment, to others. Passion and enthusiasm are the fire that drives us when we burn for something.

What followed was the search for a visual language. Using Midjourney, I developed motif after motif in countless iterations — discarding, starting over — until a style began to crystallize: the human figure, caught in binary strands. Transparent, fragile, threatened, distorted, vulnerable. What mattered was choosing those images that revealed the essence of one of the nine facets of humanity.

In parallel, a poetic layer emerged. Inspired by the existential lyrics of musician Ciscandra Nostalghia, I generated verses that unfold these facets in poetic form.

Finally, the elements that form the Resonance Chamber came together: video sequences, rhythm, song, and spoken word. In this second dimension of the series, the motifs become audible, tangible — transforming into a transcendent experience.

„The power of individuals to make of themselves what they please also signifies the power of a few to make of others what pleases them.“

C.S. Lewis, Die Abschaffung des Menschen / The Abolition Of Man

The Dance with the Devil is a metaphor for the allure of technological optimization, for the comfort in which we have settled: gleaming, full of promise — and yet dearly bought. A dance that promises freedom but breeds dependence. A pact that puts our very humanity at stake.

Dance wit the Devil

Discarded motifs from the development phase, 2025

Critical Perspective

Dance with the Devil is my plea for what cannot be measured, for what cannot be controlled. For the spontaneous, the intuitive, the contradictory — for the essence of being human. It is my statement against the technical takeover of our humanity.

The series offers no answers.
It poses questions.
It does not invite judgment, but observation —
and perhaps, a moment of pause.

Toolstack

Recherche, Text und Code: ChatGPT and Perplexity — tools of reflection and condensation
Image generation: Midjourney — the core of my work with Visual Generative AI since 2022
Video: LUMA and Midjourney bring the figures into motion
Vocals: ElevenLabs — my key tool for voice and presence
Sound: Udio – rhythms, soundscapes; every track of the series was created there

All images, videos, texts, and sounds were finally refined, polished, and shaped into a whole by me.










back Gate Shop