Yes, I love my A.I. drawing apps. I use ALL of the cyber superpowers. To me, the art of living in an age in which all of the culture and knowledge that has ever gone before us, is freely available, at the touch of a button, is an unfathomable gift. I do not to judge the tool, for all tools can be used for good or ill. The true art of this age is what and how to CHOOSE. What is the intention? We now have an infinity of choices, a wealth of time freed up from drudgery work, and a true choice of what to spend our precious time, attention, thoughts, energy, and love on.
I have a very irreverent attitude about so called intellectual property. “Whoever thinks an idea can be copyrighted has already forgotten its Source” -(does not matter who said it, right?)
In the days of many ancient tribal peoples, all things were held in common. If people signed their writings, which often we did not, it was only to further communication, not to inhibit it, and certainly we had no thought to monetize it.
All of my art and music and writing is free to all. I love that I can give away a picture to a million people, yet still have it! I invented true correct spectrum sequence rainbow tie dye, for example. That was my baby! I see it everywhere now. It stands for freedom, beauty, unity in diversity, psychedelic wisdom, and of course, the hippies of the world!
I “steal” freely, for the work of culture means nothing except in the context of the culture that creates, perceives, receives, interacts with, understands, appreciates, holds it, and changes it, which is all of us. It all belongs to us all. The first cultural creation was language. Can you imagine how preposterous it would be to claim ownership of say, a word, or a letter of the alphabet, or a number?
When the humans from Earth can be nice, and just get along, we will have free energy, and everyone will be an artist, musician, writer, etc. Whatever we want to do. Freedom can not be given; it can only be taken. The universe is abundant and there is no reason on Earth we can not afford for all to have adequate sufficiency. We should not have to beg for money for art. Nor do we need to own it.
I have been doing every kind of art in every medium you can name, for many years. Never a dull moment. My visual art bifurcated from my physical art, maybe ten or fifteen years ago, when the amazing cyber art tools became available to me with finger painting on iPad.
My fiber art had gone from simple woven rainbows, to rainbows with up to seventy five pure colors, bumping up against the range the human eye can distinguish. Then imagery began to appear. I reached a point where a detailed tapestry would take me months of weaving.
My felted paintings, toward the end, were becoming quite realistic in style.
The prismacolor pencil drawings then sprang sideways from that.
Then I got my first iPad and started playing with the art. I was amazed at how I could mix my photos, with my drawings, with any thing and everything I saw. And there were endless virtual brushes, canvasses, paper, and paints of every kind. Some times I printed up my iPad work, which itself may have derived from my previous drawings or photos or collages, with who knows what, onto large canvasses, then painted on them some more, with physical paint!
At this point, my artistic process reflects the same chaotic convergence of everything in the world, as indeed, what is going on swirling around in world culture. We obviously stand at a turning of the ages. Will it all end up as gray confetti? Who knows. As Bob Dylan said, don’t speak too soon, for the wheel is still in spin, for the times they are a changing. It is what it is.
But what about the feel and touch of real materials, art supplies, the hands on aspect of art? Did I miss that? Well, first of all, I’m glad I started out with real stuff. I see a lot of art today that suffers from the shortcuts gained from a purely cyber created image. The look is cartoonish and lazy. I am grateful to have learned to do art with real paint and pencil, because it gives a greater breadth to the cyber art. I do think the downside is there is the temptation to be be lazy and impatient! Like every thing else these days we want it fast! I’m glad I learned how pencils, paint, chalk, etc, work on various surfaces. But I don’t miss the toxic dusts, heavy metal derived colors, and fumes!
Gradually, and conversely, I moved backward, in the fiber realm, getting whole sheep fleeces from the neighbors who had beloved, well cared for, pet sheep. We, too, adopted fiber goats, who jumped for joy in the spring, when we helped them out of those heavy fur coats.
I love the smell of the raw fleece, hand washing, and finding out what color the wool really is, under all that dirt, gently combing and carding, the joy of dyeing, never knowing what colors will come out, and the texture and feel of spinning it up, a handful at a time, then making things. Right now, this very hands on art is equally my flow. I am on the eighth in a series of hand woven Shetland blankets. I sleep under them and cherish the colors and textures.
Does that diminish the absolute joy and bliss of creating new, never before seen, beautiful images on my iPad? Not at all! Yes I am really having fun with my new art superpowers, even more than what I had before.
