Walking into the Colorado State Fair’s Fine Arts Competition, Jason Allen likely did not expect great outrage when he entered and won the emerging [1] artist division's "digital arts/digitally-manipulated photography" category. Allen’s “Théâtre D'opéra Spatial” is both a remarkable blend of Renaissance and steampunk, and of the growing integration of artificial intelligence in human affairs.
Allen spent around 80 hours fiddling [2] with Midjourney, an artificial intelligence that produces visual images with user-inputted text data, to create his masterpiece. He experimented with various text inputs to narrow down the illustrations that Midjourney produced—using carefully-selected words to alter lighting, spacing, field of vision, and else—and used photoshop to finalize Midjourney’s results.
Does Allen’s “Théâtre D'opéra Spatial” count as art? Since the Colorado Fine Arts Competition, that’s the question that has been fiercely debated. If you go by one textbook definition, which states that art, generally, is the expression of human creativity, then it seems that art includes AI-generated images.
This would be in line with [3] the opinion of one of the judges who voted for Allen’s piece. The judge, who learned only afterward that Allen used AI to produce “Théâtre D'opéra Spatial,” both defended his vote and praised how artificial intelligence makes art more accessible.
Some definitions of art, however, specify that art is an expression of creativity and application of skill, which raises another question: Is using artificial intelligence to produce creative works, skillful? Some would say no. Critics say that using Midjourney and other AI is cheating or, at least, an easy cop-out [4], and thus shouldn’t compete against other artworks.
There are convincing arguments on both sides of this issue, which likely will not be resolved in the near future. The definition of art has been malleable throughout history, with each subsequent innovation pushing artistic boundaries further than its predecessor. If there is one conclusion that can be drawn from “Théâtre D'opéra Spatial,” it’s that artificial intelligence is firmly integrated into human activity, and its presence is rising every day.