AI, Art, and Andy

Yes, AI generated!

In an era when computers can generate images at the blink of an eye, the role of the artist is being reconsidered. I’d like to make a case: AI‑generated art is perfectly fine, and in fact, if Andy Warhol were alive today, he might be using it himself.

Warhol’s Ethos: The Easy Way to Art

Andy Warhol didn’t hide his methods or worship the idea of the tortured artist. He embraced reproducibility, machines and mass culture. Some of his quotes speak directly to this mindset:

“Don’t think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it’s good or bad… While they are deciding, make even more art.”

“Art is what you can get away with.”

“Making money is art and working is art and good business is the best art.”

“All photography is Pop, and all photographers are crazy… they feel guilty since they don’t have to do very much, just push a button.”

These statements point to a key idea: Warhol wasn’t interested in grand, painful creation narratives. He was interested in doing, in producing, in letting process and machine and repetition do a lot of the heavy lifting.

So, What Would Andy Do with AI?

If Warhol were creating today, it’s easy to imagine he’d embrace AI tools. After all:

• He embraced screen‑printing, photography, repetition, mechanical methods of production.

• “Machines” and “doing a lot with little” were consistent themes.

• He believed art could be everyday and commercial, not mystical and solitary.

Thus: using AI to generate images, tools to repeat, transform and remix — this would fit right into his aesthetic. The “machine” becomes not just the silkscreen or the camera, but now the algorithm.

My Process: Why I Use AI in My Art

Here’s how I make use of AI in my own creative workflow, and why I believe it positions me firmly as the artist (not the tool):

• I use AI to generate elements: backgrounds, textures, image fragments, conceptual sketches. These are inputs.

• I specify very detailed prompts: what I want, style, mood, color palette, so the image that emerges is my vision.

• I then bring the AI‑generated output into my digital workspace (or real world) and paint, refine, combine. I treat the AI output like raw material.

• The AI is a collaborator or assistant, but the creative decisions, the selection, the final art‑making is done by me.

• I believe this aligns with Warhol’s view: you push the button if you want, let the machine help you, then you decide what to keep, how to present it, how to finish it.

In other words: I told it what I want, so it is my art. The AI didn’t decide the concept, the direction, the taste, I did. The tool simply made parts of the job easier, faster, more expandible.

Why It’s Just Fine,  And Even Very Warholian

• Warhol said: “Don’t think about making art, just get it done.” The AI helps you get it done.

• He also said: “Art is what you can get away with.” Using new tools like AI isn’t cheating, it’s exploring what is art in this era.

• The tools (silkscreens, repetition, pad printing) of his time were radical. In our time, algorithms are a tool.

• What matters is vision, selection, presentation. The medium changes; the artistic impulse remains.

So, yes: AI‑generated images are valid as part of an art practice. If you (the human artist) direct, refine, choose, paint on, decide, then it is your art. Tools have always evolved. Warhol embraced machines; I embrace algorithms.

Final Thoughts

If you’re uneasy about AI in art, think of it this way: it doesn’t replace the artist. It amplifies what the artist chooses to do. Just like Warhol didn’t do everything by hand, but chose what to hand‑finish, what to repeat, what to mechanize, we don’t have to do everything by hand now either.

What matters: your taste, your vision, your choices. The AI is your creative assistant, not the creator. So go ahead: generate, paint, remix, repeat. Let the machine help you, let yourself decide. Let the art be whatever you want it to be.

“Don’t think about making art, just get it done… While they are deciding, make even more art.” — Andy Warhol