Regaining Power over AI through Artistic Practice

Regaining Power Over AI is a research initiative exploring how creative and artistic practices can reshape our relationship with AI—both practically and culturally. This initiative brings together academic researchers from public and private institutions, alongside artists, to challenge dominant narratives and foster a more nuanced and documented approach to AI practice. This initiative is supported by the Microsoft Research AI & Society Program and by ISIR lab.

Projec’s Website: https://regainingpoweroverai.org/

Past and ongoing research projects:

Creative Work in Generative AI Narratives: Generative AI is transforming creative and artistic industries. The spread of generative AI in these sectors is sparking intense debate among academics, journalists, artists, policymakers and the public. But beyond its technical capabilities, how are the public discourses on AI in the arts shaping our understanding of creative work? 📄 (Caramiaux et al., 2025)
AI Refusal by Creative Writers: As generative AI becomes more prevalent in creative fields, research has examined its impacts—both the harms experienced by artists, such as reputation loss and copyright issues, and the broader narratives shaping AI’s role in art. In response, artists—particularly writers—have organized forms of resistance, seen in lawsuits and strikes reflecting wider patterns of tech refusal and non-use. This study explores why some fiction writers deliberately avoid generative AI in their creative process through semi-structured interviews and inductive thematic analysis.
Artists on a Decade of AI Evolution: AI has developed exponentially over the last ten years or so: from the rise of convolutional networks to the emergence of adversarial and diffusion models. At every stage, these innovations have had an impact on the creative sector, shaping the ways artists use and engage with this technology. In this research project, we interviewed 30 artists who have been working with this technology for the past ten years. Our aim is to find out their views on the impact of AI innovations on their practice and the ecosystem in which they operate. 📄 (in review))

As part of the initiative, we are organizing online salons with artists. We were delighted to be able to speak to:

Marco Donnarumma
Caroline Sinders
Linda Dounia Rebeiz
Sean Michaels
Kyle McDonald.

Generative AI has gained a significant foothold in the creative and artistic sectors. In this context, the concept of creative work is influenced by discourses originating from technological stakeholders and mainstream media. The framing of narratives surrounding creativity and artistic production not only reflects a particular vision of culture but also actively contributes to shaping it. In this article, we review online media outlets and analyze the dominant narratives around AI’s impact on creative work that they convey. We found that the discourse promotes creativity freed from its material realisation through human labor. The separation of the idea from its material conditions is achieved by automation, which is the driving force behind productive efficiency assessed as the reduction of time taken to produce. And the withdrawal of the skills typically required in the execution of the creative process is seen as a means for democratising creativity. This discourse tends to correspond to the dominant techno-positivist vision and to assert power over the creative economy and culture.

References

2025