The other day I jokingly referred to Starfield’s aesthetic as “what if all old pulp sci-fi art had all been drawn by Normal Rockwell,” and I fear that lathed into existence a type of guy who is really into making that nightmarish what-if a reality.
He’s not even the only one, either! (NSFW)
“I really wish weird old sci-fi/fantasy art was more focused on manifest destiny, togas, and middle aged men who stare vacantly into the distance.”
I guess this isn’t the worst kind of AI art guy, but at the same time I’m immediately very sus of anyone who actually likes Norman Rockwell and immediately associate them with the author of Made in Abyss who cites Rockwell as a huge inspiration for him.
It is very mastubatory, and when someone brags about something “they” “made” using it, I react the same way I would if someone was bragging about their awesome wank session they had last night.
I find the whole thing deeply unsettling. There’s just something wrong about it, and every time I try to put it in to words I come up with new aspects I find disturbing. Like combining Norman Rockwell’s fashy misrepresentations of America with Frazetta’s chest-beating hyper-masculine violence? There’s nothing good about that. That’s terrible. I hate everything about this.
It’s this weird empty-anti symbolism. They use this stuff because it “looks cool” and has “aesthetic” but either don’t care about the underlying intent of those artists when imitating their work, or they do care, but will use “it’s just AI art, it has no deeper meaning” as a defence when called out on that.