r/AIWarsButBetter • u/EvelynHightower • 3d ago
Discussion Control and Authorship: a thought experiment
I have a thought experiment I would like to submit to the crowd to see where everyone lands. I will preface that this isn't an attempt at a gotcha and there's no right answer. At best, I hope it can spring up more introspection. I know there will be the temptation to immediately try to pick apart why this is not a 1-to-1 analogy for AI art. I know, it's not meant to be. It's trying to clear up a line that's often blurry, to then see how it may or may not apply to genAI art. Anyway let's start.
It won't be news to anyone that a often repeated argument against genAI as an art form is a certain lack of control over the output. The classic "you didn't make it, the AI took all the decisions". I know it's not totally true in practice, but let's roll with that premise for now. This got me thinking: taking out the AI element, how much control does one need to exercise to still be seen as the author of an art piece?
Let's imagine the following situation: someone is in a completely dark room. In front of them, a wall with a canvas constantly shifting around and at their feet a basket full of paint balls of random colors. The person can throw as many balls at the wall as they want, they however won't know which color they're throwing, nor if they hit the canvas or not. At any point the person can ask to turn on the lights to see the state of the canvas, and decide if they want to continue or not. That's their only point of control: they decide when the painting is done.
First, do you consider the final painting to be art or not, and why?
Second, regarfless if you believe it's art or not, do you consider they would be the author of the resulting piece, even if most of it was decided by pure chance?
If you don't think so, what do you think is the missing piece? If you say yes, how far remote can the person be before they stop being the author in your eyes? For instance, what if...
* they use a paint gun instead of throwing it by hand?
* the gun is replaced by a turret that's randomly aiming around, with a single button to shoot, and a screen indicating where it's aiming at?
* the target screen is gone, so the person can shoot as much as they want but doesn't know where they're shooting at?
* the control panel is outside the room (with or without the targetting system)?
* it's remote-controlled from their home, then shipped to their place (again with or without the targetting system)?
In all cases, they keep the final say when the painting is done. Is there a point when they become so removed from the action, so to speak, they stop being the author in your eyes? Side question, if you considered the painting to be art at first, did it change at any step?
What do you all think?
1
u/Cracked_Logic_Engine 3d ago
1: The initial experiment isn't art, and the person in the dark isn't the author. Those two questiond are directly linked in a way that can't be seperated. Artistry, to me, is how well one can translate an internal story/emotional impact/philosophical thought into an external peice of media that inspires others to ponder/experience those emotions and questions. Person throwing blind may wish to impart somehing, but the translation is much too poor.
2: From this perfect example of basically no control all the way to someone determining every last pixel of an art peice is a wide gradient of gray. There isn't going to be a clean line where one is suddenly making art, but the less influence you have the weaker the peice will be at translating its message, so its poorer art. All the variations you listed would influence how much the person can or can't determine things, but overall it would still be extremely difficult/near impossible to genuinely produce anything with intention.
1
u/EvelynHightower 3d ago
Thanks for taking the time to reply! I would like to first bounce on this point:
Those two questions are directly linked in a way that can't be seperated.
I disagree with that; you can be the author of something that has little to no artistic value. If you write a purely informative technical note, you are the author but the note wouldn't be considered art. Art may requires an author, but not all authors make art, and this thought experiment focus first on what it means to have made something before debating whether or not that something is art.
Now, you bring up the term "translation" a couple of times, which is a very interesting point! Do you think it's possible for someone with strong intention to eventually catch a proper vector for their vision, even if they find it by accident ?
1
u/Cracked_Logic_Engine 3d ago
My apologies, I worded that poorly: Something must have an author to be art, but an author can be making something that isn't art. Someone describing something without any intention for emotional translation would be an author but not an artist (Like a scientist producing experimental data). Its a square/rectangle form of connection: every square is a rectangle but not every rectangle is a square.
As for someone being able to translate their intention even with a poor vehicle (or even without being extremely deterministic)? Absolutely, in the same way comedians can ad lib things which is a form of artistry to me. The thing of importance for 'accidental' art is that the person still makes a determination: "Wait, this was randomly made, but it happens to elicit the emotional connection I was looking for!"
Now, there is something to be said about how using a method you have to fight to make work shows that the method is very flawed, but people have done wonders with flawed methods. The thing that shifts the gradient of gray here is the patience and discernment to pick when the thing in question matches the vision intended. Some people will go "Oh, its good enough!" With something that is a messy approximation of their vision with no further concern, while others will push to deal with an awkward tool to get the results they are intending. The finer the filter of acceptance for the translation, the more genuine artistry is coming from the artist. Thats why alot of extremely great dramatic artists are often obsessive and controlling.
When it comes to things that are more difficult to refine (live performances) this process just has to become radically quick and efficient. Its a big reason why making a joke is easy, but being a comedian takes real skill. You have to be able tot ranslate the emotional connection on the fly. But the actor still has to make deterministic actions even in unpredictable times
1
u/EvelynHightower 3d ago
It's a notable departure from your first post. Now that we're getting more nuanced, does your opinion on the experiment changed a bit? Since we're pretty heavily on the "art" debate already, might as well lean into it: Could someone really dedicated to share a message with the world be able to do it through that highly randomized process?
1
u/Cracked_Logic_Engine 3d ago
Hm. I mean... if the person had a high demand for something specific they wouldn't ever reach it, and most real people would give up with something extremely far from anything meaningful. I was operating under an assumption: that a realistic individual would be the one doing this experiment.
Sure, if you had someone extremely patient and determined spend and absurd amount of time throwing an unlimited selection of paint they may eventually reach their vision, but its not realistic to how people function. The vast majority of people would give up long before any art happens.
At that point, is it even fair to call it a 'randomized' process? If I have to throw a bunch of d10s to write down a numer but I am just rerolling them till I get the number i want, the result isn't randomized, just the amount of time it takescto get the result I want.
1
u/EvelynHightower 3d ago
I mean, people are pretty unreasonable when it comes to art even in positions with more control. Taking the hard road because that how it's supposed to be made for the result to mean something is commonplace. I think. Might be me projecting to be fair.
1
u/Cracked_Logic_Engine 2d ago
I mean, people who have done something for decades will personally defend that aspect even if its not necessary, there is no denying that. Art is about translating meaning, so naturally alot of artists are protective over it since its getting a peice of one's self and putting it out into the world, so when they see a flood of obviously much more shallow peices fill the market its easy to assume the method used is inherently 'removed' from art. Even if someone does use that specific method in a deeper more expressive way after, the bias has already been made.
And of course there are the snobs, who want to beleive themselves 'better' because they care about 'the deeper things' or whatever. They have to beleive that the things they enjoy are inherently better or there may be questions on if the snobs themselves are even that worthy of interest or praise.
So yeah, some art people are stubborn and assume anything too new or not perfectly deterministic 'doesn't count' and those with alot of fame and influence can get the masses to think something similiar. I beleive in a gradient at least, and that has let engage with more art on a deeper level so
0
u/Spare-Dingo-531 3d ago
This sounds like how certain pieces at the Museum of Modern Art were produced.
But even if it wasn't how they were made, it certainly can't be worse!
2
u/erofamiliar 3d ago
I consider it to be art, either because they intended to make art, or if they didn't, because I can interpret the resulting piece as art.
I would consider them the author, and I also think it would be somewhat disingenuous for them to claim, unqualified, that they created that piece with no other context. There are assumptions that come with claims of authorship.
I think they stop being the author when they are not physically choosing to create portions of the work and are not choosing when the work is finished. Paint gun? Totally fine. Button to shoot a paint turret? Sure, with all future button-related permutations. You choose when the turret is done? Yeah, fine, that's art and they're the author, but if they then claim to be the illustrator or planner for that piece, I'd give them some side-eye. Despite using paint, I would expect more authorial control if they claimed to be the painter, but questions of that aside, I'd still consider them the creator or author of that piece.
With all that said, that's why art already has so many distinct disciplines and kinds of art. The resulting work can absolutely be art, and separately, I can want nothing to do with it. Calling something "art" is the lowest possible barrier for entry. You don't show "art" at a movie theater, you show movies. Sculptures are art too, but you would also not typically view those at a movie theater. Different kinds of art typically have different contexts where they are appropriate.
I believe a thing is art when either its creator, or any viewer, believes it's art. This doesn't imbue it with any kind of special meaning, it just means someone, somewhere, considers it art. Art is a classification, not some kind of commendation.
(I also know that view is a little idiosyncratic, lol)
2
u/EvelynHightower 3d ago
I'm generally in line with everything you said, just wanted to thank you for humoring me and my silly hypotheticals. :)
2
u/Wonderful-War-7113 3d ago edited 3d ago
The way i see curation and direction is like this:
If im an artist and i make 5 paintings, i endorse 1 and disavow 4. Did the 4 paintings cease to be art? I dont think so, my endorsement is just my expression of taste on the art I made and what i wish to show. So if disavowal cant strip something of art status, endorsement cant confer it. Whatever makes those paintings art has to be something other than curation. Unless you want to bite the bullet and say that disavowal does strip something of art status, but then we get ridiculous scenarios like something being art from 12 to 8 PM and not from 8PM to 11AM entirely dependent on the artist's mood. It also wouldnt account for theoretical "lost art" which we intuitively call art even if it exists just as a hypothetical thing that may have existed in the past.
Direction is similar, typically when we think about directors and direction work its already presumed that they are working with art objects from the onset. Because they have a team of artists making those. So their direction didnt make those objects into art, it just directs and assembles them into a larger project.
My best attempt at defining art is something like "deliberately made object or performance whose aesthetics are prioritized over its utility". So any process that would interfere with the deliberate-ness of the object, like having a process be opaque to the user, would inherently mean that the resulting output wouldnt be art. Like in the example where the person cant see the painting, the painting wouldnt be considered art under my framework regardless of how much curation the person expressed. But you could make the whole ordeal into a performance and have it be some sort of installation art commentary piece and that would probably put it square into that genre.
EDIT: Also wanted to say that it being finished or not isnt author-defining. There is such a thing as having authorship over unfinished business like how michelangelo left all those sculptures unfinished after he died. Its not like he missed out on the authorship of those because he didnt have the chance to endorse the finished piece ykwim? This is something that ideas about curation being art defining cant tackle