AI (Artificial Intelligence) includes CHAT GPT, Google Bard, Mid-Journey and DALL-E. 

“Artificial”: Something that does not occur in nature. (This focuses our attention on concepts such as ‘Authenticity’ and ‘Originality’. The authorship of material and written outputs that appear in the world has never seemed so threatened as it is now. Who owns the material? is it genuinely new?)

“Intelligence”: The ‘Turing test’ requires that we can compare the responses from human and computer and we can recognize the thinking as human. 

There are grounds for optimism as well as anxiety.

As ceramicists, we are not involved in the software developments; we are concerned with application. Clay and computing exploit different qualities of the Silicon atom. The ‘intelligence’ of AI is based on connectivity, mirroring the structure of our brains. Can the arrays of interconnected transistors that mirror our neural pathways, become sentient, original and creative? Can an AI entity hold a patent, or is it just a tool? Will an AI entity ever have a capacity for self-awareness?

One of the most recent applications of AI to our field has involved some of the oldest written objects: the interpretation of 5000-year-old Sumerian clay tablets (the size of a mobile phone). It has been noted that when the medium (the prostheses) of ‘the message’ is changed then it also influences the content – an SMS text reads very differently to a letter written with a stylus, quill or pen.

We want to insist that human content (authorship) should be protected; this may be possible with litigation by the rich, but it will not work for the rest of us. Philippe Starck demonstrated a very creative way to employ AI by requiring the AI to construct an ergonomic chair that used inputs that exist on the Internet (from himself and the manufacturer, Kartell); this works because he cannot contravene his own copyright, and most significantly, there is sufficient information on the Internet to employ. But for lesser-known mortals there is insufficient material and information to produce an authentic looking work.

Can AI replace the maker-artist? Can it think? In experiments we can see that it can do ‘visual-thinking’ – variations on a theme, so it is making progress. The final decision made by the human designer. 

In conclusion, AI can be a useful, generative tool, but it brings implications concerning ownership, authenticity, and the direct communication that the touch of the maker brings to the audience via the ceramic object. AI can be a creative tool, generating ideas, based on our own work or synthesizing new combinations, but it can also enable our work to be appropriated by others. As artists, ownership of our creativity is a central concern – and basis of our livelihoods. Perhaps we want to hold onto that simple gesture that is recorded for all posterity in a simple squeeze of a soft piece of clay between two hands.