I Think We'll Be Okay

My (probably naive but optimistic) take on AI art

I’m trying to be naively optimistic as we near the end of the world. I feel there’s nothing to celebrate with the success of AI art, but instead it’s something to lament. There’s no real accomplishment in taking something that’s been a part of humanity since the very beginning of time and devaluing its creation and creators for the sake of feeding the content machine.

As I think about it more, I find it interesting how hostile those who support AI art can be towards real artists. I know not one child who does not draw, yet most of them give it up by the time they hit high school. The hostility that AI art bros have reads to me as a sense of jealousy. It feels as if they are jealous of this idyllic life that they believe artists seem to lead, this life where we can be free to pursue our emotions and creativity without the constraints of society.

It feels like this jealousy manifests itself into a kind of hatred towards us, in thinking that if they can devalue our work and our lives that they won’t feel the constant tug of wishing that they too could live a life away from what society expects of them. If they can prove that it’s so easy to do, then there is no part missing in them, no part of them wishing to be free and embrace themselves creatively. It feels as if deep down, they wish to be like us, yet the prospect of revealing themselves emotionally through their own real work is simply too big a burden to bear.

Better to steal someone else’s and call it a day.

Anyways, as I said earlier, good fucking luck to the AI attempting to steal my artwork. I’ve done books in gouache or acrylic or watercolor or digital in cartoonish or realistic or painterly or graphic styles and now I’ve got a newsletter with stupid comics and ramblings. Whatever AI is going to try to steal my shit is going to have a real hard time locking down a look, a story or a voice because I’m not going to stay complacent. The only thing that runs true across all my work is that it’s made with my soul, and good luck at trying to steal that!

Oh, and yeah, to plug myself again, I have a book I illustrated written by Chelsea Lin Wallace, appropriately named Dare to be Daring coming out soon! I painted it with real human hands and you can preorder a signed copy below:

As always, thank you guys for sticking around and reading my newsletter written by a real life human being and an even bigger thank you to my paid subscribers who help me pay a tiny portion of my very real human bills!

Y’all rock my world.