Neural networks already create paintings, music, poems and designs in a matter of seconds that sometimes rival works whose mastery took people years. But if a machine can do almost everything, what then is the value of human creativity? Dr. Amit R. Zoran of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem tried to find an answer to this question. His article was published in the journal AI & SOCIETY.
Zoran proposes not arguing about whether what a program has generated can be considered art. In his view, the significance of creativity is not reducible to the finished product - it also lies in the experience that shapes artists, viewers and entire cultures.
For centuries, creating something complex required years of study, experimentation and personal development. A painter honed not only technique but also a particular way of seeing the world; a musician honed both physical skills and emotional expressiveness. Generative artificial intelligence (AI that creates new content - text, images, sound - based on a trained model) changes this connection. Zoran introduces the concept of the "disconnection thesis": AI makes it possible to obtain complex artistic results without going through the path of personal development that was previously considered obligatory. Now one can generate a detailed illustration without being able to draw, or compose music without mastering an instrument.
"For centuries, creating art meant a process of learning, experimentation and changing oneself," Zoran explains. "Today AI makes it possible to produce complex works without necessarily going through that path. But this does not mean that human creativity has been devalued. It means that we need to rethink what exactly its value consists of. The real potential of AI is not simply in helping us make more images, music or designs, but in opening up new possibilities for how we perceive, understand and interact with the world."
According to the author, AI does not eliminate creativity but shifts it toward other activities: experimentation, interpretation, collaboration with technology. At the same time, the value of art extends beyond the creator - it influences how the public sees the world and how culture develops. The article cites an example of a project in which a tree becomes the center of an interactive artistic experience: smell, taste, recorded sounds, AI-generated music and visual projections. Here technology does not merely produce digital content but helps participants interact with nature in a new way.
Zoran also raises the question of how AI tools should be evaluated. Currently they are often judged by speed, realism and the quality of the result. The researcher proposes taking into account whether they encourage curiosity, exploration and new perspectives. For artists, this could provide time saved with the help of AI for experimentation and richer experiences. For educational and cultural institutions, it is a reason to value the creative process itself more, and not only finished works.
Ultimately, Zoran concludes, as AI makes artistic production increasingly accessible, the future of creativity may depend not so much on what people can do as on what they are capable of discovering, experiencing and becoming thanks to the creative process. This does not make human creativity unnecessary - rather, it offers a chance to understand anew what gives it meaning.