Authentic art creation could it be a thing of the past in the future? A two part essay written by the Art Critic ‘Spike’ for painters TUBES magazine.
This is a ‘reading’ post (no pictures) and contains nothing but words for those who like thinking about the future of Art. It’s in many parts and was originally published on the Readly platform in 2024. This is Part One.
PART ONE – Ai and observations of technology
Technology, don’t we all just love it. Those sleek iPhones and the new cool folding phones, Apple and Android pads and Chrome Brooks. They are simply to die for. Aren’t they?
How we adore our new toys, the very Smart TV’s and the even smarter game
players. We are all so modern, so globally connected and totally in love with the next shiny new device release from those big boys at Apple or Google. It’s so great isn’t it? What about creating art? Is that ahead of the curve, also?
Answers to the questions on how the more ‘traditional’ visual artists are dealing with the technology, one that engages and is so integral to our current lives, and how we would cope without it, is a question not everyone can deliver an answer too. Sure there are plenty of ‘how too’s on YouTube to help us ‘cope, but thats just the technical aspect and the not the psychological part of this new aspect of creating visual art.
Do painters of today take full advantage of the digital world? Or do they just pretend to be progressive and carry on to ignore it as a tool to create? Is the digital world seen by them as a quick way to post the soul destroying WiP’s (work’s in progress) and brag about a work sold, or be delighted to have a high street gallery take them on (despite giving away over 50% of their income? ) Those are some of the questions I have been considering over a Cold beer bought for almost nothing at my local supermarket. It’s amazing how cheap they sell Can’s of ale today, isn’t it. Perhaps its because they don’t pay the same tax as a public house has to? (Maybe I should talk about the slow, but sure, eradication by Governments of the English Public House? On second thoughts I’ll save that for another publication that deals with the history of Communism control and not Art.
Is the Artificial Intelligence brigade of a growing band of ‘digital creators’ going to destroy visual art as a serious Art Form? And will this art be incapable of showing human emotion imbued within it? Will the human creative painters also become a thing of the past?
You would think that Artists would be on the front line for progressive 21st century methodologies using the new technologies of today, wouldn’t you? This statement should be almost rhetorical. Will NFT’s be the only thing left for us to look at in galleries of the future?
It seems to me that the contemporary Art scene may well have are almost negligent is coming up with new innovative ideas to fill in the gap left by the ever increasing closures of high street commercial art galleries. The institutions have been bang at it, by getting their museums and National and trust funded Art Galleries into gear with with VR programs for years. Ones that allow the casual visitor to walk around their floors and get close up and personal with their collections. But what about the smaller commercial guys? So far what has been seen is one of two annual art fairs putting a few commercial galleries and the odd artist into a website and showing their stable of artists on jpegs (on a flat screen in a minimalist web design). That’s hardly groundbreaking now is it. Of course the artist (and one presumes also the galleries) pay for participation, which is understandable because nothing valuable that actually works comes for nothing, but is it value for the regular monthly amount of money asked of the participating artist. Maybe it is not?
Does anyone have any idea how many Pro Artist Website platforms representing artists (of which there only a few on the web) are out there over these last 10 years? And sadly, the many ‘not so professional’ offerings, trying to entice artists into parting with their small pot of shekels? All looking to earn coin from providing a real ‘solid’ service to Artists? I have no idea of the true figures, but lets just say there are probably five. It’s hardly any wonder that the VR techno boys got busy a decade or so ago. Prtobably the niche marketplace for VR galleries was wide open and left to the ‘games’ code writers to fulfil the need, with what could be called ‘naive’ offerings for the consumer.
Perhaps they heard the distant sound of those valued credit digit numbers falling into their bank account by the digital bucket load. What I do know is the ‘first’ steps were, well, how can I put this observation of the clunky, badly designed first generation Virtual Reality Galleries. Crap comes to mind and is probably the closest description. This gave VR a really bad street rep with artists.…
Part Two to follow next wednesday 18th March