A play on words from a Philip K. Dick novel, “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?.” It’s also a film by the name of Blade Runner. Both versions explore themes of empathy and what it means to be human. Instead of empathy, I’m thinking about creativity. With that in mind… is AI image generated art creative and human? Creativity after all, for me, is an innate human trait.

Is it human?
AI art is to a degree human art as it’s no doubt been generated by a person feeding the image generator prompts. Unless AI starts generating its own art anytime soon, which it might do one day. In any case for now it needs a prompt by a real person. But that’s where the “human” bit ends. What pops out after the prompts is AI generated and unfortunately (from what I hear) in a style stolen from other artists that has been scraped from the internet. The aesthetic, style and soul of another human is being used and projected. Not the soul of the prompter.

Where’s the soul?
AI image generators are good at bringing a vision to life. For me it focuses too much on the end result. Where’s the journey of discovery to uncover the happy accidents that lead on to new unthought of ideas? Where’s the little visual nuances that only exist in a creative human brain that come to life through play and creative discussion? Nowhere. And because they’re nowhere to be found the end result will be soulless. It might look pretty but I would argue it will lack depth and true human character.

So does AI art dream of electric sheep?
No. Not at all. It’s not a conscious being. Not yet anyway. That gives me Terminator vibes which is scary. No doubt the people feeding AI generators dream though. Dreams are human. But I would say what they’re creating and producing isn’t creative. Creativity in art, for me, is an original interpretation of a thought (or brief) that comes from inside my soul that solves a problem and expresses an idea. Creativity is about the journey. Not just going from A and direct to Z… bypassing all the other parts in between

Creativity is an innate human trait.
If you generate AI art because you want to create… stop… don’t just take the easy route. Pick up a pencil and a piece of paper and explore the world, inner and outer. There’s artistry in the process of creative exploration. I’m more about the journey than the end result. The journey is where fun stuff happens. That’s the creative bit. It’s not just about typing out a few ideas and out poops a bit of art. It’s about feeling what you're doing, and feeling is very human.