From voice recognition to self-driving cars to chatbots, artificial intelligence has grown at an exponential rate. And now, the concern is that it’s overstepping in the field of art, too.

Many point to the issue these AI services are going to make human artists obsolete, which means fewer employment opportunities for artists. This would further discourage artists from pursuing their passion and exploring their creative potential.

And, this concern isn’t without reason.

Much of the job opportunities for artists consist of creating digital art. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, special effects artists, animators, and graphic designers account for 47.14% of employed artists in 2021.

Here’s what’s worse: graphic designers make up the vast majority of this percentage, and their job outlook is only 3% while the average is 5%. The art industry is already on the decline. While there are material arts and directing-focused jobs that cannot be replaced by artificial intelligence, any art created in a digital format can be victim to its growing prevalence, versatility, and quality.

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But, as of now, AI art isn’t capable enough to create images better than a human artist. “Computer error” often far outweighs “human error” when it comes to art. While AI has advanced greatly in recent times, it still cannot accurately interpret instructions.

With the growing popularity of AI art platforms, many have attempted to create AI art, giving the program a few words or phrases to base the creation off of, much like text-generating ones such as Chat-GPT. However, both services produce responses of a merely passable quality that doesn’t meet the desired standard.

So, artificial intelligence is not going to replace artists anytime soon. In fact, they are more likely to be seen working side-by-side.

Many artists have begun to train AI systems by presenting the programs with an array of depictions that it can then replicate the style of. This is how one group, using an AI model called Obvious, created a portrait that sold for $430,000 at an auction when they had expected it to sell for less than $10,000.

AI art pushes past the limits of imagination and can generate semi-original pieces that offer elements of creativity we might not think to come up with, simply due to the innate spontaneity of the programming behind the models.

While artificial intelligence does pose a potential threat to art careers in the future, currently, it’s been responsible for more help than hurt.

On social media platforms, many artists are posting about AI art potentially putting them out of business while at the same time, these same artists are currently getting more attention due to the increase of AI art and the supposed danger it is, which is actually turning out to be positive.

This isn’t to say that their fear doesn’t hold weight. It does, but not for the foreseeable future.

Regardless, the satisfaction of creating your own artwork is irreplaceable. The awe of admiring the creations of a human is irreplaceable. All man-made artwork is irreplaceable.

Artists, never stop creating.