I agree with you here, that right now, generative AI is still a far cry from what media managers, capitalists and layfolk imagine it is. Currently, in order to get something interesting from generative AI, you have to know how to describe what you want so that the AI understands (or yields favorable results) and then curate the best results from several attempts, then take the piece you like, run it through, and provide more based on this image prompts. Lather, rinse, repeat until you have something that serves your purpose.
Regarding the creation of art and the definition of what counts as art, we’ve actually seen some instances where artists have toyed with the idea, such as Comedian by Maurizio Cattelan and Love Is In The Bin by Banksy (which failed to operate when it was auctioned, and is still regarded as a work worthy of the £18.5 million paid for by its current owner).
So there’s no objective way to decide what is or isn’t art. And some day, a machine may have the capacity to actually make art that resonates with us, and we’ll have to contend with the dilemma that even though this art piece was computed using a lot of media from human history, if we condemn it because it was artificially derived from countless components of human culture, we’d be hypocritical if we were to accept a similar work from a human artist.
But you are right, we’re not on the cusp of wondering if human capacity has been met or exceeded by a machine, though plenty of capitalists do wish it were so, and might invest in pursuit of such technology.
I agree with you here, that right now, generative AI is still a far cry from what media managers, capitalists and layfolk imagine it is. Currently, in order to get something interesting from generative AI, you have to know how to describe what you want so that the AI understands (or yields favorable results) and then curate the best results from several attempts, then take the piece you like, run it through, and provide more based on this image prompts. Lather, rinse, repeat until you have something that serves your purpose.
Regarding the creation of art and the definition of what counts as art, we’ve actually seen some instances where artists have toyed with the idea, such as Comedian by Maurizio Cattelan and Love Is In The Bin by Banksy (which failed to operate when it was auctioned, and is still regarded as a work worthy of the £18.5 million paid for by its current owner).
So there’s no objective way to decide what is or isn’t art. And some day, a machine may have the capacity to actually make art that resonates with us, and we’ll have to contend with the dilemma that even though this art piece was computed using a lot of media from human history, if we condemn it because it was artificially derived from countless components of human culture, we’d be hypocritical if we were to accept a similar work from a human artist.
But you are right, we’re not on the cusp of wondering if human capacity has been met or exceeded by a machine, though plenty of capitalists do wish it were so, and might invest in pursuit of such technology.