Abstract
The rise of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) has revolutionized how cultural memory and identity are reimagined in visual media. This study focuses on Singaporean photographer Chia Aik Beng’s Return to Bugis Street, an AI-generated photo series that reconstructs the erased transgender presence of 1970s Bugis Street. Once a globally known queer space, Bugis Street was dismantled through urban redevelopment and largely excluded from official archives. Through archival research and visual analysis, this study explores how Chia’s synthetic imagery bridges personal memory with historical erasure, while engaging the aesthetic, ethical, and political stakes of using GenAI to reconstruct marginalized pasts. The findings suggest that GenAI imagery, when informed by personal memory and shaped by artistic intention, can function as a counter-archive that visualizes marginalized histories excluded from institutional records and encourages critical reflection on the construction of cultural memory. To analyze the power relations embedded in GenAI image-making, this paper proposes a framework of layered gazes, including the Queer, Technological, Artist’s, and Viewers’ Gazes, which together mediate the visual politics of representation, identity, and contested memory. By situating GenAI within postcolonial and queer memory studies, this research critically examines its role in revisualizing erased histories and interrogates its implications for contemporary digital archiving and visual culture.
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Data availability
This study is based on publicly accessible archival materials and AI-generated images created by artist Chia Aik Beng. The images are not owned by the author and therefore cannot be redistributed. All qualitative interpretations and coded observations are presented within the article. No additional underlying data are available.
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Acknowledgements
The images from the Return to Bugis Street series remain the intellectual property of the artist, Chia Aik Beng, with all rights reserved. I sincerely thank Mr. Chia Aik Beng for giving his kind permission to use the images in this research and for sharing valuable insights.
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Chen, J. AI photography and cultural memory: revisualizing the queer histories of Bugis Street in Singapore through layered gazes. Humanit Soc Sci Commun (2026). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-025-06473-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-025-06473-5
