Artists outraged by artificial intelligence that can copy, in seconds, the styles they have spent years developing are waging a battle online and in court. Fury erupted in the art community last year with the release of generative AI programs that can convincingly execute commands such as “draw a dog like cartoonist Sarah Andersen would” or “render a nymph the way illustrator Karla Ortiz might.” These style‑swiping AI works are produced without the original artist’s consent, credit, or compensation—the three C’s at the heart of a fight to change that.
In January, artists including Andersen and Ortiz filed a class‑action lawsuit against DreamUp, Midjourney, and Stable Diffusion, three image‑generating AI models trained on art found online. Andersen told AFP she felt “violated” when she first saw an AI drawing that copied the style of her “Fangs” comic‑book work. She posted an indignant reaction on Twitter; it went viral, and other incensed artists reached out with their own stories. The suit’s backers hope to establish legal precedent governing generative AI models that copy artists’ styles. They want AI creators to be required to secure permission for works used in training software, with an option for artists to have their work removed, and to provide suitable compensation. “There is room for a conversation about what that would look like,” Ortiz said. Compensation could take the form of a licensing model, she mused, but it must be appropriate. “It would be wrong for artists to get a couple of cents while the company gets millions of dollars,” Ortiz added, noting her experience working for Marvel Studios.
On social networks, artists are sharing tales of jobs lost to generative AI. The suit notes that video‑game designer Jason Allen won a Colorado State Fair competition last year with art created using Midjourney. “Art is dead, dude. It’s over. AI won. Humans lost,” Allen was quoted as telling The New York Times. The Mauritshuis Museum in the Netherlands sparked controversy by displaying an AI‑generated image inspired by Vermeer’s *Girl With a Pearl Earring*. Meanwhile, the San Francisco Ballet caused a stir by using Midjourney to generate illustrations for promotional material for its December “Nutcracker” performances. “It’s a natural consequence of something being easy, cheap, and accessible,” Andersen said. “Of course they are going to use that option, even if it is unethical.”
AI companies named in the lawsuit did not respond to requests for comment. Stability AI founder and CEO Emad Mostaque has portrayed generative software as a “tool” that can handle “mundane image output” and provide new ways “of ideating for artists,” arguing it will allow more people to become artists. Critics disagree, saying that prompting software to draw in the style of a master does not make the user an artist. Mostaque has said that if people use generative AI unethically or break the law, “that’s their problem.”
Companies defending themselves from artists’ copyright claims are likely to invoke “fair use,” an exception sometimes allowed when a new spin is put on a creation or when only a brief excerpt is used. “The magic word used in the US court system is ‘transformative,’” said lawyer and developer Matthew Butterick. “Is this a new use of the copyrighted work, or does it replace the original in the marketplace?” Artists are turning not only to the courts but also to technology to defend themselves. Prompted by artists, a team at the University of Chicago last week launched “Glaze,” software that adds an invisible data layer to images, acting as a decoy for AI, explained doctoral student Shawn Shan, who leads the project. The onus, however, remains on artists to adopt Glaze. Butterick predicts a “cat‑and‑mouse game” as AI makers devise ways around such defenses, and he worries about AI’s effect on the human spirit. “When science fiction imagines the AI apocalypse, it’s something like robots coming over the hill with laser guns,” he said. “I think the way AI defeats humanity is more where people just give up and don’t want to create new things, and it sucks the life out of humanity.”
Comments are closed for this story.