Sorry, Generating AI Art Does Not Make You an Artist
DISCLAIMER: This is not about putting down AI Art or those who make it, though some may mistake it as the old guy complaining about these whippersnappers who need to “get off my lawn.” It’s about questioning and understanding the artistic mind (what makes an artist) and the consequences of unleashing AI upon the world, as cool as it is (and not just in art). It’s about being honest on how AI Art is even possible, literally by ingesting billions of finished works of art made by real artists, good, bad and brilliant. Training the silicon machines with what us carbon machines have created over centuries. It’s also about humility. Finally, it’s about ethics and dangers that we all must confront with a clear mind. It’s only meant as a provocative discussion starter, not some sort of grand thesis. I’m a generative art programmer myself.
I’m not sure most of the hordes out there typing in clever prompts into Midjourney and all the other amazing Text-to-Art generators know how AI and Machine Learning work. Even the creators of machine learning software don’t always know how it does what it does. It’s a whole is greater than the parts type of thing. A black box of sorts. But I do know this—all you are seeing is a seamless mashup of billions of existing art and photos. I don’t mean mashup in a literal sense but in an abstract sense, borrowing image information…