Art by definition requires self-expression. There is no self to express = there is no art. A generated piece of music or visual work is art in the same way a t

Art by definition requires self-expression. There is no self to express = there is no art. A generated piece of music or visual work is art in the same way a tree or the Moon is art: not at all. It may seem pretty to a human observer, but that’s orthogonal to it being art, it’s just an artifact that exists. Unfortunately, the wide availability of art-mimicking non-art artifacts devalues art. However, paradoxically, I suspect the wide availability of ML-powered generative art is also going to raise the value of direct improvisational experience, so in the end it’s a mixed bag. First we had no way to record, so we gathered to listen to music performers display live their hard-earned skill. Then we got a way to record, so we could hear live performers display their skill at any time. Then we got increasingly sophisticated audio recording, mixing, and reproduction tools, which meant what we hear on the record is not entirely performer’s mastery, but also the mastery of audio engineers & producers. Now we cannot trust that what we listen to is anyone’s mastery, really. It can be algorithmically composed, algorithmically performed, and there is no specific set of individuals whose hard-earned skill we could admire. The only way to experience that truly would either be to listen to pre-2024 works, or to attend live performances.