The Romantics We’re Trying to Save: On Art and AI
"Art imitates life" sure, but what if it gets so good at its job it stops needing the "life" part of the equation all together? On one hand, calling anything that didn't need human involvement to come into existence "art" is nonsensical, what else is art if not human creation? But then, where do we store the countless videos, images and sounds infiltrating artistic spaces and our daily lives that just… appeared without a human having to do anything more than type out a prompt? Do they deserve their own category, do they deserve to be acknowledged at all?
Among all the rage, enthusiastic support and cries of despair in the conversation around AI I sometimes hear another voice, be it a quieter one, promising a soon arriving wave of modern renaissance, a revolution of sorts, prophesied to come once we are unable to tell what is real and what was generated by a soulless machine anymore, once laws surrounding photographic evidence are rewritten, once the internet is nothing more than a bot's group chat. I hold onto that promise, tighter than I hold onto that degree that just doesn't seem to want to end up in my hands.
As a person in creative spaces it is hard not to feel angry. I am angry at the impact artificial intelligence already has on the world, at the impact it is going to have in the long run. Most of all I am angry because I was born with passions that are getting cheapened every day by human ignorance, inability to listen and need for convenience above all else.
And the worst part is, they knew. Artists all around the world knew what was coming with the first "type a prompt to generate image" laid out for the public on a silver platter. If anyone in this world is a real prophet, it is an artist. I can't help but think that every single one of them has been counting down to the unceremonial execution of their passions and dreams since the day we got our hands on all the brushes and instruments and pens we could ask for, all stored somewhere on our motherboards.
What this modern day renaissance is going to look like, I'm not sure. But I might have a faint idea. Now, I wouldn't consider myself a visual art connoisseur by any means, I can't tell you whether a painting is any good or not unless it's a work of realism. What I can tell however, is if I find it interesting. And more often than not what makes a piece interesting to me is the idea behind it, the story or the message it's trying to get across. And in there lies my hope. Hope that while maybe in the near future authentic art will step back from the mainstream world and be preserved only by those who deeply care for it, it might not die altogether. All the computer generated images in the world, however "perfect" and realistic, can't make you feel more than an unseasoned chicken, it's…meh, at most.
I had a brief conversation with my uncle who works in IT and his daughter recently. While he is a loud and proud AI enthusiast, she is just a quiet, indifferent supporter. According to the both of them, in the years to come society will split in two, the crowd who knows how to work with AI and the crowd that doesn't. The latter being left behind in the professional world. As I was sitting there, listening to their reasoning for feeding their own pictures to AI so it can generate them a nice looking, appropriate outfit to wear to the theater, I honestly couldn't decide whether I should laugh or scream. So I just stared at them, dumbfounded. While I could understand some of what they were saying, none of my words seemed to resonate with them at all.
It really dawned on me at that moment that while artists are aware of what's happening in their world to the point they are able to predict every hit it's about to take, they are still not being heard by the masses. The very people who casually consume their art are the same ones sabotaging it, a lot of times without even realising or stopping to think about it.
Those of us who are here right now were born with the promise of a digitalised, globalised world in which creating and reaching your audience is easier than ever, so to have that vision crushed only a couple years later and being forcibly moved to the background can, and does, feel like collective punishment. However, from speaking to artists instead of just consumers I've learned that if they've accepted not being able to turn their craft into income and stuck around solely for the love of creating and the joy it brings them, most don't mind stepping into the background for a moment.
With the evolution of society, especially in modern times, so many distinctly human traits have been subjected to attempts at erasure or at the very least strong suppression, yet people still speak their own languages, get symbolic tattoos, dance and love and write graffiti on the walls you couldn't distinguish from those found in Pompeii. So how could something our ancestors started with their own two hands and walls of caves be taken from us?
People are adaptable, what people create is adaptable. I do fear for arts ability to make their creators living, but I do not fear for art living itself. If anything, that fear makes me feel more connected to every other creative person who came before me, who lived in times of rapid change and uncertainty for the future.
By Karolína Fratriková