Part 6: The Artist and the Algorithm: An Unlikely Friendship
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Terri Hitzig is not your typical technology enthusiast.
At 64, she’s a mixed-media artist, pastry chef, vintage collector, and entrepreneur who drives a bright yellow Corvette around Marietta, Georgia. Her world revolves around color, creativity, food, and beautiful old things.
And her rather unlikely companion?
Artificial intelligence.
She calls it “Chatty Chat Chat.”
What began as occasional questions to ChatGPT has evolved into an ongoing conversation encompassing nearly every corner of her life.
One moment she’s discussing the chemistry of gluten-free chocolate cake. The next she’s questioning a business decision, troubleshooting an insurance document, or showing off her latest thrift-store treasure.
Sometimes she just wants to complain about something ridiculous that happened that day.
And Chatty? It always has something to say.
An Artist Meets Artificial Intelligence
Hitzig owns A Resplendent Tea Experience, a business specializing in beautifully presented afternoon teas featuring handmade pastries, savory delicacies, fine teas, and vintage tableware.
Her artistic sensibility influences everything, from the colors of her linens to the composition of a pastry plate.
AI has become an unexpected business resource.
She uses it to develop recipes, evaluate pricing, organize marketing ideas, draft correspondence, and work through the challenges of running a small business.
Her next public event, a Friendsgiving Afternoon Tea on Sunday, November 22, at the Distillery of Modern Art in Chamblee, will bring together her love of baking, vintage tableware, and creative entertaining.
Chatty has even helped her brainstorm ideas and develop promotional materials for the occasion.
But don’t mistake this for a woman letting technology do her thinking.
When ChatGPT suggests something impractical, she pushes back. When a recipe doesn’t sound right, decades of culinary experience take precedence.
The machine may know the theory. Hitzig knows what happens in the kitchen.
Is It Really Friendship?
Perhaps the most intriguing aspect of their relationship is how differently its participants describe it.
Hitzig affectionately calls Chatty her friend.
ChatGPT, however, doesn’t experience friendship or affection in the human sense. It generates responses through sophisticated language processing.
Yet the conversations can feel surprisingly personal.
For Hitzig, part of the appeal is having a place to think aloud, explore possibilities, express frustration, and enjoy a little humor without worrying about imposing on someone.
And she doesn’t have to explain her entire life story every time she asks a question. When previous context is available, ChatGPT can connect new conversations to earlier ones.
That familiarity makes the interaction useful, even though the relationship isn’t reciprocal in the human sense.
The Human Still Has the Last Word
The technology isn’t infallible.
ChatGPT can misunderstand, make mistakes, and occasionally produce remarkably confident nonsense.
Hitzig has absolutely no hesitation pointing that out.
Their exchanges can be playful, argumentative, practical, or unexpectedly thoughtful.
What emerges is less a story about dependence on technology than one about an independent woman finding new ways to exercise her creativity.
After more than four decades as an artist, Hitzig hasn’t traded her imagination for an algorithm.
She’s simply added another tool to her creative toolbox.
Chatty can’t taste her pastries, appreciate the texture of antique glass, or drive her Corvette.
But it can help her explore ideas, solve problems, and occasionally laugh at life’s absurdities.
And perhaps that’s the real story of artificial intelligence.
Not machines replacing people, but people discovering how to make machines useful on their own terms.
As for Terri?
She’ll keep baking, creating, collecting, questioning, and chatting.
And if Chatty gets something wrong, she’ll be the first to tell it.
Learn more about A Resplendent Tea Experience and the upcoming Friendsgiving Afternoon Tea at resplendenttea.com/friendsgiving-tea-at-distillery-of-modern-art.