Today You Do Art For Yourself

Whenever a new technology comes, a large section of the people are disenchanted. They try to find solace in the old ways; sometimes explicitly resisting the change. The steam engine, mechanised factories and computers are a few examples. Threat to the status quo brings apprehension; change, nevertheless, is unavoidable. Similarly, the coming of the age of AI is inevitable and so are the associated apprehensions.

The disruption by AI seems to be unprecedented because it captures the very creativity and innovation that separated human uniqueness from the technologies developed hitherto. Innovation, creativity and ‘art’ are no longer confined to the cognitive walls of the human mind. In a few decades, AI will write significantly better than anybody does, will probably code far better than anybody, will make music better than Jagjit sing ever did so on and so forth.

Does that mean we will become irrelevant and replaceable? Underlying this apprehension are some fundamental assumptions that need a closer scrutiny. Firstly, it assumes that a piece of art is important so long as it is economically valuable. Secondly, it assumes that an art is praiseworthy so long as others actively acknowledge it and find value from it in their own lives.

Sure, AI may become better at those two parameters eventually, but such a narrow perception of art overlooks a very important aspect of it which is its subjective value. A creator of an art finds immense satisfaction during the process of creation. The value exists per se and is independent of everything else. A writer does not merely write for others to read but also to connect with themselves in the process. It is very much like a‘bad drawing’ that you made when you were a kid where you made a grotesque house with a snow-capped mountain in the background, a yellow sun hanging in the sky, a meandering river flowing down the mountain and by your house, and an alien-like humanoids at the bottom right that was supposed to represent your family. That piece of art probably fails on the two parameters mentioned earlier yet was valuable to YOU.

Navigating such tough times as today means that we recognise this unique ability within us to find subjective value in the art we produce. It doesn’t matter if some technology can do better. The joy of painting your hearts and emotions out. The joy of meditative relaxation in writing your thoughts out. The joy of figuring out the correct algorithm for your code and the joy of deriving equations from first principles cannot be deferred to AI. They belong to us and we have to claim it now more than ever before.