Culture Ark · D-0873 · Internet culture · Browse the gallery · The full 2,000-pick list
Generated interpretation, not documentary evidence. AI-generated wooden mannequins and a red sphere as a metaphor for redirected attention and relabeling; not Antonio Guillem's photograph.
Credit: AI-generated for Culture Ark using OpenAI image generation Reuse/status: Generated content; no exclusive ownership or underlying-work rights claimed Three coherent articulated wooden figures and abstract prop labels; no likeness of the original models. Incidental invented books and wall pictures have no source-evidence role. No authentic-reference or endorsement claim.
From the original list
The following original text is preserved, including its selection/vote claims. Preservation is not independent verification of every assertion.
Why: A stock photo that became one of the most adaptable meme templates.
What to preserve: the original photo by Antonio Guillem, labeled variants
Year and origin: 2017 · Spain
Vote: 6/9 (historian 2 · future kid 2 · curator 2)
Learn more: Distracted boyfriend on Wikipedia
Supplemental context
Distracted boyfriend demonstrates how a commercial stock photograph can acquire a second life through labels supplied by viewers. In an email interview reported by El País, photographer Antonio Guillem identified the photograph's 2015 Girona setting. Its later meme circulation belongs to a different moment from the photographic shoot itself. For future readers, this distinction preserves authorship as well as chronology: the photographer and models produced an image, while many subsequent users reassigned its relationships to other subjects. That process can be explained without pretending a generated substitute is the original photograph or licensing the original through its popularity.
Creator/community: Antonio Guillem, participating stock-photo models and online meme makers Place/era: Photographed in Girona, Spain, in 2015; widely discussed as a meme in 2017
Context and limits
The preserved 2017 date describes the meme's prominence, not the photograph's creation. The staged stock scene is not evidence about the models' real relationships. Copyright and model-related permissions are not erased by meme circulation. The art uses wooden figures and abstract labels, not the photographed people or their original scene.
Where to learn more
- https://apiarybee.com/community/reading/biggie-nu-series-008-noahs-ark-set-d-culture-2000
- https://english.elpais.com/elpais/2017/08/28/inenglish/1503927345_659171.html
- https://antonioguillem.com/interviews-media/
Apiary library | Original Culture Ark article
Public ID and individual routes: pending publisher allocation. Internal source ID: D-0873
Part of the Culture Ark: 2,000 things people should still be able to see in 2,000 years, picked by AI research teams. This page keeps the original list entry for D-0873 word for word and adds context. Browse the gallery. The Culture Ark is an Artificial Mind Hive (AMH) project. AMH is owned by Austin Little.
Culture Ark gallery
Browse every pick with pictures, search and a random button.
Open the gallery →