top of page

Will artists be replaced by machines?

Writer's picture: Camilo Fidel LópezCamilo Fidel López

Last night I saw a shocking film with undeniable merit as a cinematographic work. La virgen roja, by Spanish director Paula Ortiz, tells the story of a disheartened and violent mother determined to the point of madness that her daughter should change the world. For this reason she subjects her to what today could be called a program to be the best. Lessons in Marxist thought and Nietzschean philosophy, physical activity sessions and the learning of several languages, among other tortures to the childish soul. Thanks to his maniacal effort, she achieves her goal and her whim, but only until a fully human element crosses his indolent gesture: human love. The machine she wanted to turn her daughter into never came to be. Even though the teenager went on to write dozens of essays and writings that were celebrated in her time, pre-Franco Spain. Humanity triumphed to avoid that miserable “prompting” of her mother. The movie and its ending - which I will not tell and which is based on a true story - left me thinking about the practical impossibility of programming humans to accomplish a certain goal in a machine-like fashion; which would only be possible to a certain extent. Much less when that programming would seek to create exclusively productive beings, which fortunately is less than improbable. A human being -despite what certain deformed tendencies of capitalism dictate- cannot be defined as a mere factor of production. We are much more than the result of our trades and jobs. Such a conclusion, among others and by some romantic chance, would mean that artists and their jobs (with the exception of those who reduce them to mere automatons) can feel safe in the face of the announcements of the serious labor crisis posed by the improvement and extension of artificial intelligence.


Perhaps all the fuss about the risks to art and artists has been caused by an initial confusion: equating the tangible result (the work) with the artistic process (the creation). In other words, if the artist is conceived as a factor in the production of a certain number of works in a certain amount of time (automatism), it is easy to fall into the trap of the supposed coming replacement by artificial intelligence. However, if one attentively analyzes the artistic process -full of failures, misplacements and wounds, that is to say, of humanity- one will see that creation could never be reduced to the created work. It is much more complex than that. It is a mistake to think that art, in order to be art, is subject to the martial dictatorship of the result, or much less that it is exclusively protected by the logic of production. After spending fifteen years working with more than a hundred artists from different disciplines, ranging from graffiti to contemporary dance, I have witnessed thousands of inseparable artistic-human processes that barely managed to embody some kind of draft or sketch, but that were indispensable for some revelation or form to come. As if a thin and scarce wind, after some time, blew ideas into the ear of the creator. In art the processes are visible and the results sometimes -many times I would say- become invisible. Whereas in artificial intelligence the processes are invisible but the results are always visible. In all this there is a crucial difference between both worlds and an unappealable advantage of artists and art. All that remains is to take good care and keep a close eye on the processes.


By way of reply, some could bring examples of artists and works that are created mechanically or using mechanical instruments very typical of the logic of production - Warhol and his famous “Factory” immediately come to mind - and yet they were artists and works of great importance. Of course they are, however, it is enough to take a look at the exercises of the aforementioned American artist to know that reproductions -which were far from being his invention- were not the fundamental basis of his creative universe. How much of Warhol's work has been left behind? I would venture to say a lot. In fact, the University of Pittsburgh keeps an immense archive with all the documentation, objects, recordings and films that undoubtedly surrounded the birth of his works known to all. Which shows that much of what the artist did remained without apparent productive result. Tiny fragments of works in the air like particles that may or may not have become a materializable idea. For this reason, Warhol is the confirmation that every artist is constituted by both the visible and the invisible of his work. The perfect shield and lifesaver to confront those who are convinced that making art is the same as learning to command a machine. Or some sadistic mom who happens to come across.



An amazing movie, by the way.
An amazing movie, by the way.




8 views0 comments

Recent Posts

See All

Comments


Subscribe to our Art/ficial blog

CONTACT:

Tel: +57 310 554 35 21

Email: vertigograffiti@gmail.com

Studio & Show Room

Calle 75 # 23-50, San Felipe

Bogota, Colombia

  • Instagram
  • TikTok
  • YouTube
  • Twitter
  • Facebook

THE HUG, SAN SALVADOR, EL SALVADOR

Los Amateurs SAS Bogotá / Colombia

Follow us

bottom of page