Abstract
Contemporary AI art’s diverse and widely recognized repertoire features numerous artworks that share conceptual, thematic, narrative, procedural, or presentational properties with other artworks across disciplinary and historical spectrums. AI artists occasionally leverage well-sanctioned poetic referencing as an asset but when obvious or easily discoverable similarities remain unacknowledged, they may become liabilities. Lurking behind the hype waves in the media, art world, and academia, these liabilities shape contemporary AI art’s cultural identity and affect its social impact. As part of a broader study of poetic contingencies, in this paper I discuss selected AI art exemplars whose multifaceted expressive parallels are symptomatic of the field and beyond. I argue that expressive similarities in AI art are as detrimental to its cultural value as they are avoidable in its variety of important topics addressable with a wide range of creative affordances. My critique takes the well-informed autonomy of expression and the socially responsible freedom of creative thinking as the tenets of artmaking to indicate some of AI art’s related issues and challenges induced by its entanglements with AI science, technology, and industry. In conclusion, I suggest that poetic similarities open a valuable perspective for studying AI art’s strengths and deficiencies and for articulating a broader critical discussion of art and creativity.