Visited an AI art gallery in Austin last weekend and honestly it felt hollow

I went to this new AI art exhibit at a gallery downtown Austin on Saturday. Everyone online is gushing about how creative these pieces are, but I left feeling kinda empty. The images were technically cool I guess, all hyper detailed and dreamy looking, but after the fifth or sixth piece it all started blending together. None of them had any real story behind them, no human mistake or happy accident. The artist just typed some words and picked a winner. I asked one of the curators what the AI's training data was and they dodged the question. It makes me wonder if we're losing something by calling this art instead of just generated imagery. Has anyone else seen one of these shows and felt the same way?

3 comments

3 Comments

max_ross4d ago

Started noticing this same thing with "AI enhanced" photos my friends keep posting. They all look good but also kinda samey, like there's no real personality in any of them anymore.

nancyw973d ago

Yeah I actually used to defend those AI filters but you're right, they just erase all the quirks.

lucashart3d agoTop Commenter

Right? That "samey" thing is exactly what I've been noticing too. I actually read this article a few weeks ago about how these filters are trained on datasets of what's considered "perfect" features, so they literally smooth out any asymmetry or unique facial stuff. It's like we're all slowly getting pushed into looking like one generic face that's just "good enough" instead of like, us. Makes you wonder if we're just trading personality for a version of "perfect" that doesn't even exist.