Writers are on strike, mass lawsuits, and a general feeling that a lot of data has been used without consent — it all culminates in a question: Is AI art, art? We asked our network to find out.
Jenny Nicholson, Innovation Consultant at Movement Strategy.
Jeff Koons has a team of 120 people who do most of the actual creation for him. He puts it pretty plainly in fact: "I’m physically involved, but because I’m working on a lot of different projects, I’m able to make paintings, work on sculptures, I’m working with people, articulating people the same way you articulate a fingertip – your mind tells your finger what you want to happen, and I’m having my vision exercised in a similar manner."
And he's not the only one. Michelangelo did not paint the Sistine Chapel alone. Damien Hirst had other people paint his spots and even let them choose the colour.
The question really comes down to what we believe is at the core of art. Is it the technical capability? Or is it the vision?
My biggest issue with most AI art is that its boring. It'd be boring even if someone painted it themselves. But when people use these tools to create things that wouldn't be possible in the real world, that's when I start to get excited.
“The question of whether generative AI art is actually art delves into a can of worms that’s been open since the early 20th century.”
Tim Green, Artist, former Design Lead at Google.
Generative AI is an incredible tool to lower the barrier to image creation for many people unable to do so effectively before, much like other tools before it.
I remember being taught graphic design by tutors who were annoyed that we didn't have to do the hard graft of physical typesetting and that we could scroll through hundreds of possible typefaces with free abandon.
In fact, the question of whether generative AI art is actually art delves into a can of worms that’s been open since the early 20th century. Classic works like Duchamp’s ‘Fountain’ from 1917 or Cage’s ‘4’33’ from 1947 changed how we perceive the authorship of the artist through use of pre-made objects and environmental sounds.The idea that an artist has to be the sole technical author of a work died a long time ago but the current conversation is not without new moral quandaries.
One issue with this tool’s functionality is that (almost) none of the artists gave consent for their work to train these algorithms and be used in, essentially, a derivative way. However collage artists, hip-hop producers and many more creatives have been doing exactly that for years.
This type of innovation is frequently ahead of the law and, again, the cat is out of the bag. Where we are now speaks to the need for more nuanced legislation around copyright much like the Creative Commons movement tried back in the 00s. Maybe AI can help write it…
“The question is not whether AI art is art but whether will AI define a new branch of art.”
Gianpaolo Tucci, Design Consultant.
What is art? Is art a form of communication? Is art everything that communicates and evokes emotions to the fruitor? Is art (subjective) beauty? Is art a human activity that involves creativity and talent to express an idea? And much more?
It's a question we might struggle to find a unanimous definition for, and even more when the question is whether AI-generated content is "Art".
The nature of art and related concepts of creativity, interpretation, expression, and form among the many, are exposed in what is called the philosophy of Aesthetics, which considers why people like some works of art and not others, as well as how art can affect moods or even our beliefs, with a critical reflection not just on art but also on culture and nature.
In 1965 Yves Saint Laurent designed “The Mondrian Collection” an homage to the work of several modernistic artists, creating a bridge between Art and Fashion.
Technological acceleration has given the possibility to access and connect information as never before, supporting the development of "transversal creativity" a creative approach and mindset able to connect different disciplines integrating diverse ideas, knowledge, and skills for various fields to foster solutions and perspectives.
Since AI has been becoming a mass-market product, its influence in democratising content creation has been disruptive, providing all of us the opportunity to visualise and combine subjects and styles from different disciplines, without the need to be able to craft as artists or designers as Saint Laurent did. What is clear is that AI in the creative landscape is certainly a tool that can support Artists during the research, intuition, and expression phases.
The question is not whether AI art is art but whether will AI define a new branch of art — as the cameras did back in the day — and how will influence the artist's creative process.
What I find interesting is the development of the "interpretation game": how humans with their creativity and intuition will be able to influence AI randomness, where our emotions, experiences, preferences, and knowledge will still be the key ingredients of what we intend to communicate, even if using such tool as AI to deliver "enhanced" visual messages, that I love to call Aesthetic's Imperfections.
The intersection or interaction between AI and art is more than just a debate. It can be seen as a dance in the experience, communication, and interpretation between technology and human dialogue. The question isn't just about AI art as art; it's about how we, as creators, will shape this new branch and guide its potential.
“It's never about farming it out to the machine.”
Nihal Tharoor, Founder & CEO, Scriptic.
At Scriptic, our whole ethos is about curation and collaboration with these tools. It's never about farming it out to the machine.
We release stories each month and we utilise generative language models, diffusion models, and language models to help us do that, but at the same time, the story as a whole is crafted by a human.
Does that make our stories any lesser because of it? I don't think so. In the future, we plan to open these creator tools to the public. By empowering more people to tell more stories, we see this as not just a benefit to our own narratives but to creative storytelling as a whole.
So is AI art, art? Hard to say. If it's the product of human engineering, I'd say so.
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