Growing up in the early 2000s, Texas-based artist DeltaSauce was the kid who could get lost in a magazine aisle for hours. While his mom shopped, he’d flip through glossy pages filled with interior design layouts and bold cover art, finding unexpected inspiration in the curated chaos. With a woodworker dad who built functional beauty from scratch, DeltaSauce learned to appreciate design as both art and storytelling — a theme that now echoes across his career.

At Marfa Art Blocks Week 2024, DeltaSauce debuted his first installation, an assembly of vintage CRT monitors, the boxy televisions that once took center stage in 1990s living rooms. The artist repurposed the still-electric artifacts as canvases for his AI-generated work. At an event hosted by White Walls, an app for turning your Apple TV into a rotating digital art gallery, the screens of six assorted Panasonic and Sony cubes flickered with imagery created by generative tools like Stable Diffusion and MidJourney.

Look closely at DeltaSauce’s artwork, and you’ll recognize his influences right away. His work contains the neo-surrealism of Iowa-born painter Jim Buckels, the vivid stillness of English painter David Hockney, and the cinematic mood of Edward Hopper, the American realist painter we all know from the 1942 painting, “Nighthawks.” Building upon these icons, DeltaSauce employs AI to craft works that feel almost as familiar, yet recontextualized for our time.

This interview took place at the lounge at the Thunderbird Marfa during Marfa Art Blocks Weekend, where DeltaSauce reflected on his artistic journey, his first-ever installation, and how he uses AI to reimagine the aesthetics of the past.

‍Note: This transcript has been edited for length and clarity.

OpenSea: Was there a specific moment or project that inspired you to explore generative art?

DeltaSauce: I got started in AI art because my friend told me to try putting my photography into generative AI art models and just play around with it. Back in the day, I was into photography, and my friend encouraged me to experiment. I fell in love with the process. It was all about the infinite possibilities of what outputs I could create. I really dug deep, and I’ve never turned back since.

OpenSea: Can you tell us about what tools or platforms you use?

DeltaSauce: I use a lot of tools, like Stable Diffusion and MidJourney. For upscaling, I love Magnific; they’re phenomenal. I like to incorporate as many tools as I can into my process because I don’t want to limit myself. I want a workflow between different models, not to be stuck with just one.

OpenSea: How do your personal experiences, culture, and background influence your work?

DeltaSauce: My personal experiences are rooted in my memories of growing up in the early 90s and 2000s. Nostalgia plays a big role in my artwork. I like to incorporate elements of my past and blend them with Web3 elements like Pepe memes. For me, it’s just about creating an island of past memories that people can share in. We all have these feelings of nostalgia, and I want to tap into those collective memories.

OpenSea: What exercises or practices help you get into your creative flow state?

DeltaSauce: To get into my flow state, I look at a lot of photography from the 70s, 80s, and 90s — it inspires me because I have a love of the past. My latest collection, “Issues,” was inspired by old magazine covers. I grew up with magazines. My mom would leave me in the magazine section while she shopped, and my dad was a woodworker, so I’d look at a lot of interior design and furniture magazines. That love of old-school, classy magazine aesthetics inspires me. Modern covers are filled with too much information, but the older ones focused on the artwork, and I wanted to bring that feeling back with my “Issues” collection.

OpenSea: How do you decide on the parameters to guide your creation process?

DeltaSauce: I focus on the intent and meaning behind the story or narrative I want to tell. It’s not just about making something beautiful; it’s about creating something beautiful with a story and a purpose behind it. I want my work to spark conversations. When I’m working on big collections, I think about the story I want to tell and how to expand on it to make it meaningful.

OpenSea: Do you find yourself continuously revising and tweaking your work, or do you know when it’s done?

DeltaSauce: For me, the work is never really done. AI allows for constant iteration. You can start with a base idea, explore different realms like post-photography, and always go back if it doesn’t work. I look at my past work and think about what more I could have done, but it’s all part of the learning process. As an artist, I’m always pushing, iterating, and learning from what I’ve done to improve future projects.

OpenSea: What brought you to Marfa, and what makes this weekend special for you?

DeltaSauce: I came to Marfa because I heard it’s a great experience and a wonderful place to meet people and connect. This is my first time here, and I love it. I definitely want to come back next year. Being here allows me to have deeper, in-person conversations about my art, which is harder to do online. Plus, I built my first installation here: old CRT TVs displaying my artwork. It’s exciting to bridge the gap between digital and traditional displays.

OpenSea: Where can people find you and your work?

DeltaSauce: You can find my work at DeltaSauceArt.com or on Twitter at @delta_sauce.

DeltaSauce: Thank you for having me! This was my first formal interview, and I really appreciate it.

OpenSea: You did amazing! Thank you for sharing your story.