What’s the Case for Studying Art in the Age of AI?

My nine-year-old son does not enjoy my art lessons. Painting and sculpting hold none of the excitement they once held for me. I am, sadly, unable to channel the chill authority of Bob Ross, and my argument that artists make the video games he loves fails to move him. In an age where the average wordcel can prompt an AI into producing competent, even impressive images, his skepticism feels understandable. Why bother?

And yet, I keep pushing him towards paintbrushes and oil pastels. Not because I expect masterpieces, but because the value of art lies less in the artifacts it produces than in what the process does to the person making them.

Perspective

Making art changes the way you see the world, even if the output you create is mediocre. Ask someone what color snow is, and the answer is easy: white. Try to paint a snowy landscape, or look at these images, and the answer becomes annoyingly complex. Snow turns blue in shadow, purple at dusk, and a subtle green under trees. You’ve seen these colors all your life, but probably didn’t notice them.

Making art trains you to pay attention. It teaches you that appearances are more nuanced than they first seem. In the way sprinting builds up your VO2 Max, making art attunes you to the visual world.

Tacit Knowledge

Seeing better is a worthy goal, but art making helps you understand it more deeply as well. Making art, even in small, amateurish ways, gives you a feel for how the world is put together. Modern schooling leans heavily on abstraction: mathematical rules, grammatical systems, scientific theories, and historical timelines.

Materials humble us. Polymer clay and potter’s clay behave nothing alike. Paints from the same manufacturer vary wildly because different pigments have different physical properties. Materials resist you. You learn that hard-to-quantify attributes, such as surface finishes and textures, matter a great deal.

Making something, anything, restores respect for reality.

Socialization

I recently learned that male pufferfish create intricate underwater mandalas on the sea floor to attract mates. They swim in circles, creating beautiful patterns, and adorn them with shells and rocks as an invitation for the female to lay her eggs. This fact reminded me of friends in high school who learned to play the guitar not out of love for the acoustics, but because mastering acoustics might win them love.

Even if AI destroys much of the economic basis for art, the emotional value will persist. Making art is a demonstration of patience, sensitivity, coordination, and surplus time that will remain attractive even outside the market economy. AI can generate images, but it can’t replace the human desire to be seen making them.

Artistic careers may be more challenging to forge, but making art as a way of seeing, understanding, and social signaling has a bright future ahead.

At least that is what I tell my son.