Alright, it’s time I threw my voice out there in all this mess.
AI art. Should we fear it? Ban it? Embrace it? I’ve gone back and forth from curiosity to fear, anger and hope, and everywhere in between. I’m still not fully concluded on what I think about AI art, but I do have thoughts. Do feel free to add your own, if you’re so inclined.
First and foremost, apps like Lensa are scraping artist’s personal work without their knowledge or intent. That’s just blatantly wrong. Probably legally so. Garbled signatures appear in so-called “original” AI conceptions, on what is essentially a Photoshop filter app that just rips styles wholesale out of an unsuspecting artist’s social presence. I’m not blaming you for doing a thing that’s fun if you jumped on the bandwagon, but moving forward, I’d exercise caution, first for the sake of the artists in question, and second for the data that you’re giving these companies. That, I think, sets up the structure of this conversation.
Let’s look at this sticky wicket on two fronts: First, commercial art. What effect does AI have on this market, and why should I care? Second, the implications for images, both illustrative and photographic moving forward.
Devil’s advocate says: AI is just a program doin what humans do, learning from their styles and replicating them, you learned by imitation too. This is a Bad Take. Let’s say I learn to be the cheap version of, I don’t know, James Jean. He’s a big, super busy, super talented artist. He no longer takes some commissions because they simply can’t afford him, especially since he can afford to do whatever interests him. Let’s say I’m a successful imitation, and I take, I don’t know, thirty to forty projects a year. I do not take two thousand projects. I do not produce millions of prompts. I do not replace thousands of artists at fifteen dollars a month.
Devil’s advocate says: AI helps even the playing field! It democratizes art! This is an Okay take. But herein lies the problem: the creative field is not one where we’re all drinking champagne and pooping gold. The ability to make art for oneself versus license art at scale reduces an already undervalued creative commodity to almost zero.
The Devil responds: Well you’re just John Henry breaking his heart pounding railroad nails! Why fight for back breaking labor? Rendering is dead, now we can push ourselves to new creative heights by making AI do all the busy work! This is a Very Bad Take. I, and most of the creatives who stay in the field, fall in love with so many aspects of the work; the craft; the moment to moment decisions of line, brushwork, and color. This is a job I love, and it can be hard work, but it’s fulfilling work. It’s meaningful. Reducing the hard stuff to a prompt, removing those moments of euphoric flow in service to an end product is missing what makes art, art. I’d rather do something else if being a so-called artist meant milking an AI for images to stitch together.
Devil’s Advocate says: Cat’s out of the bag. AI is here to stay and you either get out or adapt. This is the Worst Take. It’s also probably the most realistic. But I’m fucking tired of spending decades worshipping big tech pretending it hasn’t brought us closer and closer to social and financial ruin.
I remember having conversations in the early 2000’s about the blue-sky possibilities of social media, ‘back when Facebook was hip.’ There was so much positivity about how truth could blossom, lies and manipulations would wilt in the light of constant information. It sounds so stupid now, doesn’t it? You want to know why social media leads to conflict?
The incentives are all about profit. There’s no commitment to bettering society, or being a common good. It’s either a product, or you are. Is it free? Then you’re being used. And the way they use you is to push outrage, foster division, and amplify conflict. Because ads need eyeballs, and the only numbers they can run are engagement, and humans engage most when they’re excited. Excited by fear, anger, and resentment. If social media were a public good, the experience would be entirely different. But it isn’t. And neither is AI. AI is poised to destroy livelihoods, and for what? Progress?
Some fucking capitalist with no respect or understanding of creativity scrapes the pixels of thousands of artists and uses the language of inclusivity and positivity to sell us our own roasted fingers? I’m sorry, but I’ve heard this song before.
“Cat’s out of the bag!” WE built the cat. WE sewed the bag. We’re allowed to put it back. The only reason we won’t is because corporations have spent years pushing us under and saying, “what can we do?”
Oh, privacy doesn’t exist anymore. Sure, but what could we do? It’s not like our own inability to protect your data, or in some cases our craven selling of your data, or in some cases the blatant psychological testing of your data is our fault. Bullshit. They’re not inevitable, and I’m tired of pretending they are.
“Gosh, sure wish the companies that gave us all nice new boats to ride out the rising sea level didn’t also put bombs in them, but hey, can’t put the toothpaste back in the tube.” I’m so tired of this apathetic, nihilistic, bullshit response to a complete abdication by our government from protecting our rights.
Having said all that, it’s very possible that this AI runs into the same problems as self-driving cars: computers aren’t good for actual split second decision-making or inspiration. Artists were never going to make money off of people getting custom Facebook profile pics. No one really wants to make that children’s book their friend’s aunt has been thinking about for ages. No, I don’t want to design your tattoo. And any CEO who thinks they can just get really good at prompts and no longer has to hire a middle man to create work for them might quickly realize how much effort image curation still takes, even when the computer does 90% of the work.
I think there will be a stratification of who comes to AI and why, and there will always be some percentage of need for high-quality, specific art. But the value of that art may continue to drop, to the point where you’d have to use AI to make any kind of profit. And maybe this makes me an old man, but the value of my art comes not from how fast I can make it, but the honing of my craft and my ideas. I take pride in being an illustration professional, which is already an endangered profession. I wasn’t interested in fine art because I like to solve problems with my images, to tell other’s stories and to be a part of enriching the experience of people who would happen upon my work in any of its venues. If that version of illustration dies, my career as an illustrator may die with it, not because I’m unwilling to adapt, but because the market became inhospitable to human expression, timescales, and values.
Finally, on the implications of these programs for the future of our privacy and the already fractured shared reality of our society: I’m not going to put on a tin foil hat here, but these programs are very good at making things look real as well as illustrated. Photographic manipulation of images, when prompted by sick minds, can get very troubling very quickly. This thing isn’t a tool. It’s a gun. And I know Americans have a tough time wishing for gun regulation, but I think we recognize that a gun is as dangerous as its user. I hope you understand, without me having to say, what someone could do with photos of you or people you know at ANY AGE with this kind of software. Consider those implications. I don’t think I’m off base for calling for an early, aggressive legal and regulatory approach to guiding this technology.
