One thing that's lost in all the AI discussions I've read so far is that where the artist (or whatever you want to call him/her in a specific context) matters a lot is in their ability to recognize something truly beautiful and capture it, distill it, and disseminate it in a way that people can relate to.

I remember reading an interview with David Gilmour once upon a time where he was talking about writing Shine On You Crazy Diamond. As I'm sure you're aware, it has this iconic 4 note riff as its main theme, which, depending how you look at it, ends on a sharp 4th, which is weird and awesome. According to Gilmour, it was an accident, a bum note that he struck while messing around. Gilmour is Gilmour for a reason, one of the great masters of rock melody, so he hears that and immediately says, "This is genius!" If I did the same thing I'd probably scold myself silently for fucking up and move on, never thinking about it again.

I guess my point is that so much "genius" in the world are happy accidents that the discoverer just happens to recognize as something new and fantastic. No doubt that AI generated images are going to change the nature of art, but art isn't about pigment on paper...we already have laser printers for that. I'm not sure I can say anything profound about what art is, exactly, but I know it isn't medium-specific. Early days of AI-generated images are going to suck (from a content POV--but fucking hell, movies sucked at first, too). Eventually the field will evolve and people will find awesome ways to use the powerful new tools in the toolbox.