By Sara Valle
AI is revolutionising the world – and whoever says otherwise is lying.
It feels real – ChatGPT talks like a person. “I’m here to provide information, answer questions, and engage in natural language conversations on a wide range of topics.” It always knows what to say and it can also breathe life into photos, craft Impressionist-style artwork, or complete the missing parts of a picture to your very specific requirements.
If you have zero to no art skills, that’s not an issue either – just type your creative vision and it’ll make it happen for you. You can be as weird as you want. Do you want a pineapple riding a wave on an ocean of melted cheese and lava on a moonlit beach in Jupiter? Your wish is its command.
It can even design your next tattoo.
James Bore, 40, used Midjourney AI to create his latest ink: a cyberpunk/futurist boar, which is both a pun on his surname and a reference to his British heritage.
“I described the style and image I was going for, and then refined it as the images were generated, adding extra keywords until it had the right ‘feel’,” says Bore, a Chartered Security Professional from London. His tattoo artist took those as reference images and came up with his own ideas.
But is bringing your tattooist an AI-generated design to work from acceptable?
“I would happily receive and translate an AI design into a usable tattoo image in my own style,” says Alice Nicholls, owner of The Fine Art of Tattoo in Colchester.
Nicholls finds AI fascinating. “It has given an opportunity for non-artists to create a tattoo concept closer to what they imagine,” she says. “It gives tattooist a good starting point for their design.”
The Evolution of Tattoos: From Ancient Traditions to Modern Markets
Humans have been etching stories on skin for centuries. While some viewed these marks with scepticism – like the Greeks and Romans, who branded slaves and criminals – others saw ink as tokens of affection, protection from evil, and even to signify status or religious beliefs.
What can’t be argued is that tattoos are a growing trend. The most recent data from Pew Research Centre shows that the worldwide tattoo market was worth a whopping £1.47 billion last year and it’s predicted to soar to a staggering $3 billion by 2030.
For some, ink jobs are more than body decoration where skin turns into a canvas.
“Some styles aren’t largely about the artist expressing themselves, it’s more so of a technical exercise in replicating a precise rendition of an image,” says Nick Whybrow, owner of Camden’s The Good Fight Tattoo.
“In those cases, AI can have a space because the art side of the tattoo isn’t front and centre. Other styles are all about creating a feeling and less about the technical skill, so this feels like something an algorithm isn’t the tool for the job.”
The AI Dilemma: Balancing Creative Collaboration and Jobs
AI was a buzzword during the opening keynote of Adobe MAX 2022 last year, as the company announced their AI, Adobe Sensei.
Chief product officer Scott Belsky said AI should only ever be artists’ “co-pilot” in their creative endeavours, and that it was conceived “to benefit creatives, not replace them”.
But artists worry this is not the case.
The eternal machine of absolute truth and debate, the Internet, has been briming with alarms and opinions on AI.
Some argue it’s depriving artists of job opportunities, as a few might prefer obtaining AI-generated artwork for just £5 with a few clicks, instead of commissioning an artist. Others are worried about copyright.
“It is essentially using work and skills of humans who aren’t being paid for it sometimes to the point of recreating an artist’s recognisable style very clearly,” says Cat Regi, 41, a neurodivergent watercolour artist. She owns a studio workshop in Sheffield, Badibidu, where she “focuses on anti-perfection and celebrates variety and colour in the natural world”.
The Intersection of Art and AI: Optimism, Concerns, and the Human Touch
AI could potentially improve connectivity by recommending artists filtering them by style, says John Sewell, 26, founder and CEO of Cosimo Art, a platform designed to make art more affordable and accessible for both artists and collectors.
Sewell thinks AI will improve the lives of artists in the long run but understands their concerns.
“There are still a lot of unanswered questions around copyright and the use of imagery by living artists to train the algorithms,” he says.
Nicholls doesn’t think AI will replace human talent just yet. “Tattooists become known for their art style and that’s why they become popular with their regular clients,” she says.
But Whybrow from Camden thinks that when it comes to ink jobs, designs need “to be made in consideration with more than just the sum of the ideas” as “the placement on the body can depict the shape and flow of a design”.
“A customer inputting their ideas into an AI generator having not tattooed people wouldn’t consider this and the many other variables that can shape a tattoo design,” he adds, saying that it’s all about the “human experience being portrayed through someone’s art on skin”.
“Instead of teaching AI to mimic our art and then wait for robotics to catch up to put us all out of a job, we should be celebrating the human element of tattooing, celebrating the unique innovator tattooists, and making sure we preserve the history of a beautiful artform,” he says.
“Through so much of human history [tattooing] has been a way for humans to express their life and their stories through a journey of ink, needles, human expression, pain and then healing to create a memory which lasts a lifetime.”
This piece features humans and wasn’t written by AI.
Link to published article: https://hollowayexpress.org.uk/art-by-algorithm-is-ai-the-death-of-tattoo-design/
Sara Valle 