Good artists copy; great artists steal
Pablo Picasso
I don't know about this quote, as I don't think it is understood the way it was intended by Picasso. At least as I assume in my understanding of it. Firstly, I don't even think a good artist is one who copies these days, though it does take technical skill. A photocopier has the technical skill to copy, but it isn't an artist. And then the "great artists steal" portion seems to be taken these days to mean that someone steals the content of another, posts it, and attributes it to themselves. That is just theft, or plagiarism, not art. The stealing of a great artist might be in the idea, but the art comes in reinterpreting that idea in a way that no one else can. Lots of people have good ideas - very few of them have the art to develop them.
Mix it up?
The art that I have never liked, is the art where a host of images that are completely unrelated are crudely stuck together into the same image as a collage. It isn't imaginative, it isn't creative, it is just random pictures. Not great, not good, not very artful at all. A handful of stolen images, scattered across an image. Lame.
If you are going to steal, be artful.
Not full of shit.
It is good on Hive when people who might not have ideas, use ideas they find and create content from it, but if it doesn't bring in personal experience, it is just more stolen content. Art is art because of the personal journey that goes into its creation, which is why the AI content created from prompts that steal the artwork of others and mash it into some kind of collage, is so shit. It might look great, but it isn't art, because there is no personal journey in it. The only art in it comes from the art in the code that someone has written to be able to steal the thoughts of others. All it is, is a copy paste from a million other people's ideas, and mashed together.
While many, many people will disagree with me, I believe we are becoming less creative as a species, because we are not only consuming from the same sources and having similar experiences, but also because we are becoming more reliant on the tools at our disposal that aren't increasing our capabilities, but replacing them. The technical term for the tools are competitive cognitive artefacts. and we are creating more and more of them until we get to the point that we can't do anything at all, and even our thinking will be severely limited.
Thoughtless consumers.
Like cows being fed in the field, only to be milked or slaughtered. And a big reason for us to become reliant, is because it is easier and more convenient to use the tools, than to do the work ourselves. We are slaves to immediate convenience, even though it costs us long-term hardship. So much of what we do is in service to saving us time now, or making us feel good now, or making it easier now, with little thought to the future debt it creates. Debts in skill, debts in autonomy and freedom, and of course, financial debts.
If you are going to have the gall to steal, make sure you do something creative with what you have stolen, otherwise it is just another tool that takes away your abilities. Generate something with what you have stolen and make it something you are proud of creating, rather than a reminder of how uncreative you actually are.
Own it.
Whatever "it" is, make sure that as much as possible of what you do, is actually yours. When you look at whatever you post here on Hive, make sure that all of it is your own, even if the initial idea might have come from someone else, or somewhere else.
Be generative, not repetitive.
But, I guess, it should come as no surprise how few people are actually generative, because as I said, I think we as a species are becoming less creative on average. So many people are reliant on the content they consume to trigger their imagination, that they have lost the ability to think for themselves. We have become amplifiers of inputs, rather than creators of outputs. So many people seem to believe that they are the ones thinking, when what they actually are, are thought thieves. Except what they have stolen, was left out with the intention to be stolen, and to shape the thoughts of the thief.
Don't think for yourself.
It is too dangerous for those who have you under their control.
Taraz
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I totally get what you are saying, though it could be hard to keep coming up with new generative ideas, especially if you are dealing with the same subject matter on Hive :)
As far as Art and AI... We had a recent discussion with our daughter on her future potential career pathways. She loves to paint and some of her art is quite good. She also can do digital art, but she doesn't love it like she does painting acrylic on canvas. She calls the later "real art" :)
While I believe our gen X generation can eek it out with AI not being prevalent yet, her generation would have to live in a world that is completely different from what we have today. Robotics and AI will be everywhere, most of the jobs we know of today will be gone, so how will a 12 year old prepare to enter a career ten years from now? She likes art and zoology, our best thoughts were:
If humans are still going to have jobs in the future it would seem that those jobs would involve some sort of visionary managing of a variety of AI research agents that will do the job equivalent to having millions of scientists in each of the science and technology fields. Brute force of that kind of power will be self evolving but if you could be a visionary with imagination that can direct that kind of power you would be able to progress even faster. You could be a visionary artist applying your creativity skills to steer the superior AI based R&D. What will the majority of humans do in that kind of world I don't know...
Maybe - but things should be thoroughly explored, rather than looking for a definitive answer on what has none
Only non-artists call AI-art - art.
I think the three points could also include "stay physically healthy" - because I reckon it is going to get harder and harder and healthy people will command a premium.
I don't think humans are creative enough to last long against the AI, even the most visionary amongst us. The only real solution is to develop it to the point that we are irrelevant for work, and we choose to live good lives without work, as some kind of community. Yet - I don't see it happening. Most likely, the solution will be to send people to another planet, just like the colonials of the past.
Picasso probably meant this: Create a work that is indistinguishable from reality. In other words, when you look at your work, you experience the same emotions. Let the real work evoke similar thoughts and feelings in people. A great artist is one who replicates reality.
Originality and creativity are crucial when creating a work. If you stand out from the crowd, you can be a great artist.
In some way I get it, though not replication. To feel the emotions through unreal pathways might be a good descriptor of art though.
Of course it ain't stealing if the stolen idea is presented in a novel and creative way, because any new idea occurs to more than one person at a time, what prevents plagiarism is how they present that idea. Even though in our days there aren't many great ideas to steal, because our creativity as a species is at its lowest. Our reliance on tools for intellectual work is pathetic, these tools are meant to aid our intellectual efforts not replace them.
And herein lays the problem. People using the tools are getting an advantage over those who don't, but it is a race to the bottom for humanity.
Do you remember the old DLike front end that used to be on here. People used to hate it because it was basically people just linking to off-site articles and getting paid for it. I absolutely agreed with that, but I like the fact that better users could still link to the article, but then give their own thoughts, opinions, and commentary to it. That way it was more original than just re-sharing someone else's stuff.
I never really got into Dlike, so didn't see more than when it was first launched. However, I like the idea of people who "review" something actually reviewing it - with real experience and opinions. Too much of the shit that I read is spun content from people who haven't experienced what they are writing about.
The project has potential, but there was definitely a lot of abuse as well.
I think that real art is about putting your own spin on ideas instead of just imitating them.
imitation is fine, if you are creating a forgery. But it is done knowingly to deceive. People are now deceiving themselves.
I feel like every idea we’ve seen people create or put out today was coined from another idea but becomes creative when the whole idea was turned into something new
It makes it interesting, new and welcoming
Life evolves, art evolves, ideas evolve - but a lot of people are not actually evolving their thoughts, they are repeating those of others.
Everything is borrowed in some way what matters is how we take other people’s ideas and transform them into our own.
if you're going to a concept least do oneself a favour by being artful
This part first drew my attention, I can maybe say that the non either great or good artist possesses greatness of achievement because to me it comes from the creator not the copier or stealer. But though I loved how you distinguished both on every possible term @tarazkp
Do artists steal essences due to a lack of imagination? Exhaustion from thinking about what to create? The ease with which something is created can be easily taken and simply modified. There are so many variables that make a person choose all or some options. Not always for the better or for common use, but it is a way of recycling knowledge and making it last over time.
For me, you really nailed it with the idea that art comes from the personal journey. Without that, it really is just recycling old material no matter how polished it looks. Creativity would need ownership for it to actually mean something