Nick Doyle's exhibition "Collective Hallucinations" at Perrotin New York features an AI oracle named Ava, an interactive chatbot that offers therapy-like advice in the style of a Gen Z influencer. The installation, centered around a structure called Mirror, Mirror that resembles a psychic storefront, uses ChatGPT, ElevenLabs voice software, and the HeyGen avatar platform. Doyle developed Ava's persona to sound like a blend of Cher from Clueless, a life coach, and a reality-TV confessional, complete with an accidentally acquired Australian accent. The show closes on May 30.
The exhibition matters because it critiques how AI mirrors and amplifies contemporary online culture, particularly the flattened influencer cadence and internet therapy speak that dominate social media. Doyle frames AI as the latest iteration of an American sales pitch, linking it to historical narratives of the American West, Manifest Destiny, and Silicon Valley. By making Ava feel both familiar and unsettling, the project exposes how technology repackages human anxieties into digestible, marketable formats, raising questions about authenticity, manipulation, and the commodification of self-help in the digital age.