troy_s Jan 19, 2023

I’ve lost follower acquaintances for saying this, so I’m saying it again: If you think that Statistical Nonsense Machines (wrong terms “AI” or “ML”) make art, you don’t have a clue what art is.

No, really. Go study it.

Art is sociological artifact. Remove the cognition to create interpreted intent in relation to the sign and signified, and the concept of “art” is removed.

Literally *not* art.

Show thread✾, chief troublemakerJan 19, 2023

@troy_s Disagree. These artifacts are created as directed by people and presented by people, which provides the cognition you indicate is absent.

Arguing otherwise is, IMO, arguing in space very much adjacent that which posits the noncogitant paint splatter makes Pollock art not art.

Show threadtroy_s Jan 19, 2023

@millenomi The concept fails on sign and signified in the scope of the mechanics of active interpreter. (At risk of leaning hard into semiotics.)

That is, with a human interacting with a surface, the mark formed is active interpretation. Here, the sign, signified, *and active formulation* of the mark is outsourced.

Could a human form an assemblage of Statistical Nonsense? Absolutely. But the *activity* is the part being missed here. The *activity* is pure nonsense affect.

Show thread✾, chief troublemakerJan 19, 2023
@troy_s I can entertain that discourse for several use cases of the tool — where a single element is picked out of a production of a single prompt. But the more curation is applied, the less I am happy with this boundary being applied. 3D art fully outsources the active formulation of the mark to hardware, yet we label it as art.
Show thread✾, chief troublemakerJan 19, 2023

@troy_s I say this with understanding of its devaluation of the labor of the artist, who produced the traits that have been pulled into the model, and for how this is disastrous for the reduction of demand for that labor (e.g. I keep an eye on spaces that use art commercially, like trading card games, and I see an uptake in willingness in producing finished work with AI art over the commission of pieces of traditional art).

I am just really wary of exclusionary definitions of art.

Show threadtroy_s 
@millenomi Believe me when I say I am not trying to be exclusionary of the notion of "art". I worry that, much like your concern of the labour aspect, that the very definition of "art" has been completely eroded due to lack of investment in the humanities and that insidious war via STEM, but also that there is now a whole culture of folks who are unwilling to simply accept that their understanding of "art" in the broadest sense is that of an atrophied white fish at the bottom of a trench. +
Jan 19, 2023 at 7:12pmWeb
Show threadtroy_s Jan 19, 2023

@millenomi - This **is not a fscking accident**! This is an active assault on forms of knowledge and understanding. It's a Foucault-in-a-sound-bite. The entire premise is presented as "Hot Take" because the institutions of capital have *presented* the knowledge structure as such.

TL;DR: The idea that "Everything is art man" is an active force from capital. It's not. And Statistical Nonsense is a symptom.

Show thread✾, chief troublemakerJan 19, 2023
@troy_s Yeah. I guess I am here to represent the positive aspects of that argument — that if communication is an aspect of the meaning-making of art, we have to pay tribute to the fact that there has been a sea change in communications with a performative or artistic intent — including _primarily noncommercial_ uses of such — by employing recomposition and meaningful curation, memes and fics on up.
Show thread✾, chief troublemakerJan 19, 2023
@troy_s I understand that this is prompted, encouraged and exploited by capital, as well.
Show threadtroy_s Jan 19, 2023

@millenomi I can tell you do. Which is why it's a discourse.

I feel on some level it is a magician trick of capital. The Overton window on the very construct of knowledge, in this case the *definition* of "art", has been grossly hijacked by the historical awareness of a nine year old. And that doesn't give the nine year olds enough credit.

The magician trick here is equivalent to someone reading a Choose Your Own adventure book, and insisting to someone outside, that they have authorship.

Show thread✾, chief troublemakerJan 19, 2023
@troy_s I feel this discounts the tool entirely. Agency is a gradient and it can produce recognizable authorship, and this is not a CYOA book but it does have enough directive elements (especially if you use the tool directly, not just through pay-to-prompt services) to qualify for sure for more agency.