AI and the making of art
There are lots of things that need saying about ‘ so called ‘Artificial Intelligence’ and art, and for this blog post I’m just focusing on one thing. I’m seeing a lot of people claim that AI levels the playing field and allows people who are normally excluded from doing art to be able to make art. I think this is total bollocks, so here we go.
Creativity takes effort. It’s not about having a rush of inspiration and then being magically and swiftly able to make the thing you imagined. Every kind of creativity takes time. People who put genuine creativity into the world have spent years studying their forms, learning skills, developing ideas, practising, striving, messing up, starting over. Creativity is not held in some elitist way by a lucky few who are keeping everyone else out. Creativity is a lot of work, but being creative is available to anyone willing to put in the time.
Putting in the time is good. If you’re so excited about something that you want to be able to do it, then the process of learning is a wonderful thing. Investing years in something you are passionate about gives you joy in an ongoing way. Being able to pull something out of the ether, using a few words and someone else’s work won’t give you that. It might be briefly satisfying, but it’s not like having developed skills and understanding that allows you to really create.
Whatever kind of creativity you’re exploring, every time you make something yourself, you have an experience. You learn, grow, refine your ideas, find new things to reach towards. Yes, I could persuade a computer to make viola noises for me, but what would that give me compared to the day to day process of trying to manage the bow to get the best possible sound from the instrument I have? I’m not much of a visual artist, but there’s something exciting about being able to compare what I can draw now with what I was doing a few years ago and seeing how I’ve improved.
Tools are good. I’m typing this, after all and I’m glad of the technology that allows me to share what I’ve typed. Nothing would induce me to use the AIs that claim they can write your blogs for you. I write because I want to develop my own thoughts, and I am at least as invested in the process as I am in having something to show at the end of it. Tools are good, but anything that offers you something for nothing is lying, simply. AIs do not enable creativity, they rob the people using them and teach little or nothing about what it takes to grow as a creator. It might be amusing to use in the short term, but there’s little satisfaction in that sort of process, as I suspect the people trying to use it will find.
If a short-cut takes out some awkwardness, that’s always worth considering. However, much of what’s good in life lives in the details, the experience and the process and the more we undertake to have done for us, the less room there is for our humanity and our souls.
