Art & AI
When AI creates beauty, we feel cheated. It was supposed to be our thing. Something to express our talent and uniqueness. When you & I create something, a lot of time and effort goes by. So when we finish the thing, we feel a sense of happiness, as if all the suffering and pain was worth it. We feel as if we earned it.
But now, when you see a stunning piece of art, and you hear it was made by AI. You donāt like it, why is that?
Thereās a drop in emotional attachment once the "human sweat" is taken out of the equation. Because we've grown up believing that struggle equals authenticity. We don't want the truth. We want the illusion of depth. We want to believe someone suffered for our pleasure.
In 2018, a portrait called Edmond de Belamy, made by AI, was auctioned at $432,500. People were furious. Some said āthis isnāt real art.ā Others said, āthe algorithm deserved no credit.ā The absence of struggle disturbed them.
We adore the story of J.K. Rowling writing Harry Potter on napkins in Edinburgh cafĆ©s. Now imagine a bestselling book generated by an AI trained on all of Rowlingās works. Same story. Same characters. But most readers would scoff. Because no hardship or magic was involved in the process.
From Van Gogh to Sylvia Plath, weāve mythologized pain as a prerequisite for beauty.
A painter spends 200 hours on a canvas. Another finishes in 2. We instinctively respect the one who suffered more.
But if the final work hits the same?
What then?
There is struggle that sharpens the work, brings magic to it and then there is struggle that just signals effort.