I am fascinated by the emergence of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and intrigued by the use of AI for generating text and art. I have played with some AI tools, to see what they create and to be informed about how they work. They can produce poetry and art that I think would impress most people.
There are many concerns about the use of AI tools and their use of existing creativity and their impact on creators. There are increasing calls for it to be banned, but that ship has sailed and AI is here to stay.
As you know I write haiku poetry - a form which is easier than many to create using AI. I also paint digitally - and the digital medium is being confused with AI generated art.
Increasingly I'm being accused of using AI tools and so I thought I'd try out some of the "AI detectors" that are available online to see what they would make of my art. The results are fascinating and worrying.
I used the three top rated AI detectors; Illuminarty, Optic AI or Not, and Hivemorderation. I asked them to analyse my own digital art work for whether they were generated by AI. They failed in almost every case and decided my art was AI generated.
Let me repeat that....
The AI Detectors wrongly assessed my digital art as AI.
This may not seem like a big deal, but it means that I can expect to get more and more criticism about my art just because it's digital and quite abstract in nature.
Of course this shouldn't matter to me or to those who enjoy my art, but it is something that all digital artists need to be aware of.
Below I'll share the results I obtained from the 3 AI detectors. But before that I thought I'd share what one of the AI detectors thought of my really bad photo of a painting by AF Klint at the Tate Modern last month.
Even this is deemed to be possibly AI generated.
And so to the results of my test of the AI Detectors.
Optic AI or Not - failed to detect my digital art in all but one case.
Hivemoderation - was much more accurate but not perfect, especially with my very abstract digital art.
Illuminaty - failed on every piece of my art and said that they were all AI generated.
What does this mean?
Well it means that those of us who create art digitally are likely to be even less accepted in the art world than we were before.
I create for my mental health not for fame or fortune or inclusion in art exhibitions so this isn't a big issue for me.
But I am concerned for the many disabled people who use digital tools, to create their original artwork, because these the most, or only, accessible form of creativity. It will not be the David Hockneys of the world who suffer condemnation of their art; it will be the emerging artists from minority groups such as disabled people, who will be excluded yet again.
And yes, I know that there are great concerns about AI generated art and poetry, and the plagarism that the AI tools use to generate their instant pieces, but let's not throw the baby out with the bathwater.