Whether it is in the form of spell checks or navigation applications, artificial intelligence has long been a huge part of our daily lives. However, it rose to prominence at an alarming rate over the last few years in the form of generative AI chatbots. AI has undoubtedly become the most popular buzzword of the decade, as we see at least one generative AI feature with a sparkle emoji logo blasted everywhere from social media to subway ads. Whether it is ChatGPT, Google Gemini, or even DeepSeek, the world is flooded with news about the latest technological achievements in generative AI models.
With the excitement and admiration for the newest technology, however, comes guilt, fear, and dread.
Am I actively committing arson on Earth just because I was too lazy to write my emails myself? When even was the last time I wrote my own email? Am I stealing from an ailing artist for this funny little flying dog I generated for this e-vite? Speaking of AI images, why am I so irked and bothered by the AI slop of Jesus shared by my extended family on Facebook?
The motivations behind this research have their roots close to my own practice in the visual arts. As a graphic designer in the creative industry, there is nothing new about having to learn how to use a new fancy digital tool or two to keep up with the ever-changing, competitive industry. In fact, I would even argue that the constant need to evolve and adapt is one of the most exciting and rewarding parts of the job.
The rise of generative AI technology, however, is something that I had never seen before. No matter what the intentions were for backing up its creation, this “tool” was inherently being marketed and seemingly being used to replace many creative workers like me. Even with my distaste towards the technology and the “art” it produces, it was concerning to me how hypocritical it would be for me to fully condemn AI, as I was already ignoring some of the ethical considerations and using ChatGPT to generate emails and use the generative fill features in Adobe suite programs I use for my practice on a daily basis.
My personal struggle with this paradox reflects a much larger societal dilemma: we want the benefits of advancement without fully reckoning with its implications. We choose to turn a blind eye to ethical considerations for convenience. Upon reflection, I realized the problem might not be the technology itself but our framework for understanding its purpose.
How can we as humans and those who create reclaim our agency for a future where technology and creativity go hand in hand with each other instead of technology defining the arts?
What can we do now so that the humans in this hypothetical future would not have to start a humanity renaissance for damage control?
What can we do now so that humans can stay humans and not let a human invention determine our existence?
According to the 2025 Future of Jobs Report by the World Economic Forum, “graphic designer” will be one of the fastest-declining jobs between 2025 and 2030. This is especially alarming since just 2 years ago, for the 2023 report, graphic designers were considered to be a moderately growing profession.
The rise of generative AI technology is an unprecedented technological development. Whatever the original intentions were for its creation, this supposed “tool” is innately being marketed as a magical solution to save money and save time to streamline our “work” so that the average user can focus on the “more important” things in life.
In theory, these free, accessible generative AI image tools allow people who lack the “skills” to generate sleek imagery with a simple text-based prompt without the need to learn how to use actual design tools, most of which are behind paywalls for industry-level features. However, many developers of these tools are glossing over the fact that they are scavenging an infinite number of sources created by artists over centuries on the Internet to create a database for the generated imagery.
All of this is, of course, not going unnoticed.
In December 2023, the New York Times filed a lawsuit against OpenAI and Microsoft for copyright infringement of their written works, sparking a wide debate on unauthorized usage of published work for training artificial intelligence models. The lawsuit requests that the defendants be held accountable for the financial damages of copying the published works of The New York Times. It also calls for the extermination of any chatbot models and training data that use the copyrighted materials. A few years later, in March of 2025, a federal judge rejected OpenAI’s request to throw away the lawsuit from The New York Times, allowing the copyright infringement claims to go forward. The lawsuit is still in progress, but it is undoubtedly a huge win for the publisher and copyrights of written work.
Nevertheless, we have yet to see a large-scale lawsuit like this in the visual arts.
To learn more about where the visual arts are with generative AI copyright infringement issues, I reached out to talk to three different organizations that work with creatives in the U.S. to learn more about their stance for their members in regards to generative AI technology.