this post was submitted on 12 Dec 2025
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Socialism
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Oh gosh what a contentious discussion. I used to be anti AI and am still reluctant about it. But for reasons i admit that are not practical. And when it comes to practability.. art has always been both practical, and ideal. The first cave paintings are of practical use, they serve as guideposts and acts of communication. However, their depiction— of humans playing, dancing with animals— are ideal. They set intentions to reverence, even though the practical reality of humans and animals is predator and prey. They give a moment of awe and imagining to other possibilities. Worship is implored, and through this culture an interconnection cosmology forms.. humans arent just predator, they are receiever/giver. This translates to practical understanding of cycles and relationships both important and integral to hunter-gatherers.
At a more personal level, I recently had a partial finger amputation. I'm a musician of 30 years. You can imagine my grief. I felt ruined, that my art could never be seen again. Yet now i have even more drive as an artist. I use electronic instruments and incidental sounds which perform themselves. I do the orchestration, composition and conducting. I, having an ideal objective, am letting go of my decades of training as mandatory for that practical expression.
Maybe I can never play music the way i could ever again. But I am still an artist and still I express. Whether its ability or accessibility aids, an artist articulates the material as expression in form. A brush stroke or stable diffusion are tools, just as a violin or algorithmic synth program are tools, to express their ideals in practical, material ways.
To me that's the key distinction between the artist and the tools they use. I do photography, and you could argue that I'm just pointing my camera at things and pressing a button to get an image. Yet, if you give the same camera to an amateur, they're unlikely to produce anything interesting with it. Being able to identify an interesting picture is the skill I developed. My eye is now trained to spot interesting composition, subject, lighting, and color. The tool itself is incidental. If I had the time to spend to learn to draw, I could apply these same skills within that medium and produce interesting results that way. Similarly, you're able to come up with interesting notes and patterns of music, and using different mediums to express yourself does not diminish that in any way.
Beautifully put. The human element can still persist.