🎨💻 From Brush to Pixels: Are Artists in Danger of Extinction?
Tough.
The idea that the most creative and well-paid jobs are the ones most exposed to AI is already well-studied. Last week, we reviewed a paper that concluded that jobs requiring a university education are more exposed than others. A few days ago, another study came out with similar conclusions: the higher the salary level, the higher the level of education required, and the greater the level of creativity required, the greater the exposure of jobs.
Level of exposure of jobs to language models (dark points) and image generation tools (light points). It shows that as salary increases (panel A), the level of education required increases (panel B), or the percentage of creative tasks in the job increases (panel C), exposure also increases.
But the testimony above (translated and shortened from this Reddit post) shows us another side of the impact of AI on creative jobs. Something less quantitative and more emotional. What happens when machines occupy the artistic space? Will artists be left without work?
To try to understand, let’s draw a parallel with another invention that shook the artistic space some years ago: photography.
Credit for this and other photos to
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Its invention in 1820 caused immediate uproar in artist communities, where its artistic value was debated. Some thought it had none and that its role should be purely instrumental, while others saw its potential as a new medium of expression.
In 1859, Charles Baudelaire wrote:
Photography quickly began to displace artists in some of its more “practical” applications. For example, it could make portraits faster and cheaper.
Portrait in painting (left) and photography (right) of Napoleon III.
Or it could represent landscapes and cities more accurately.
On the left, a painting of the Doge's Palace in Venice by Peruvian painter Federico del Campo. On the right, a photograph of the same place by Carlo Ponti.
If Reddit had existed in the 19th century, I imagine we would have read very similar testimonies to the one we saw at the beginning of the post.
The interesting thing (and Baudelaire's worst fear above) is that photography not only replaced art in areas where it was cheaper or faster to take a photo. It also positioned itself as an artistic medium.
Exhibition of the London Photographic Society. 1858.
But photography as an artistic medium did not replace painters; rather, it opened up a completely new medium of expression. More importantly, its independent development and evolution gave rise to other artistic expression mediums, such as cinema.
From left to right, and top to bottom: Blade Runner 2049, Tree of Life, Dunkirk, Fantastic Mr. Fox.
Photography had another catalytic effect on art. Now that artists were not bound by the “functional” use of art as the only reliable means of representing reality, they could pursue their passions and creative paths with total freedom.
“Thanks” to photography, movements like abstract expressionism were able to emerge. In the photo “Untitled” by Jackson Pollock, one of the movement's references.
Will the same happen with AI tools? Will it allow people like @SternSafari to free themselves from their constraints and become better artists? Will it open up new artistic expression mediums unimaginable today? If photography gave us something as surprising and fundamental as cinema, what will be the “cinema” that AI unlocks?
The only thing that is different from this parallel with photography is the speed of change.
Look at the evolution of the first photograph over 12 years.
On the left, the first photograph in history (1826) with another taken in the same place 12 years later.
And now look at how Midjourney has evolved in just one year.
Same prompts used with version 1 of Midjourney (April 2022) and version 5 (April 2023).
It seems that our questions will be answered sooner rather than later.
