Blogs

The Myth of AI (Artificial Intelligence). September 22, 2025

​     I’m actually bemused at people who call AI artificial today. 

I guess they never heard of Digital Special Effects with George Lucas & Star Wars since back in 1988. 

What do you think you’ve been listening to in music for the last 60 years ? 

Overdubs, multi-track recording, auto-tune, reverb, distortion, delay, lip synch on so-called live shows ? ​

Or that the invention of the tractor didn’t unemploy over 30 workers with families overnight. 

Like the Beach Boys weren’t the Wrecking Crew or over 60 bands from back in 60’s.

It’s impossible for me to see what you do not, I see hope, vision, possibilities, properly used. I see as a child in not how it was made, yet what was made, a dream, a vision, the possibilities. I think it is humorous that at times they have 3 eyes, many times, it’s our free Hironimus Bosch, with all of our flaws,  just like us.

Do we all have unrealistic demands on artists today, while the reality is much more sobering? Is Disney the only one that can make independent films or fairytails ? We treat our artists like crap, looking, seeing, commenting, all the while never purchasing art ???  Sorry, I have to pay my rent. . Go out with my girl.​

Everyone wants free art.  Why pay artists, Musicians, Poets Artists, who are all in the same boat while no one gets paid today, and yet we criticize AI like we're invested?

I think we all forget that Rembrandt & Vermeer in the 1640’s used the camera obscura to make their drawings expedient. AI isn’t magic; it doesn’t draw itself. It’s a brush that needs direction. Like a child, it has no taste, no intuition, no aesthetic of its own. It's individual; everyone's images will look different.

I feed AI my photos, experience, guiding it literally with custom prompts, drawing, and ruthless editing. It has three different parameters that we feed the original image o​f my choice, second a specific verbal prompt, and third a mixing of the two above.

 Like any good editor, most of my process is saying no over 30 times to one until only the real work remains. 

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I shared the same space with Keith Haring at SVA in 1974 – 75 for a year, it was a period of growth for both of us, he couldn’t have been more delightful, even though his work was very cartoonish, he had brilliant energy, which explains much of his success. It's so funny, most wana be artists go into it thinking it is easy, Keith bared getting arrested many times, staying up all night, many, many nights, using collaborations, along with his luck, yet we didn’t know what to do him. He was more Pennsylvania hick than anything; it was a little hard to take him seriously with these cartoons and his boyish looks.

So much for my ability to spot talent. Then there was the incident where, out of frustration, he and Basquiat spent the weekend redecorating the back stairway on 23rd Street, all three floors of it, on an amphetamine-filled weekend. We were stumped, as these 8-foot-high murals went all the way up, it was an epiphany of black on orange walls. It's still under there, painted over. He got expelled immediately, and that was the last I ever saw of him, and as much for SVA’s abilities to also spot talent.

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Meeting John Lennon. His legacy is a strange one. What one felt about him when he was in a room with him when he was alive, he was mesmerizing, then 40 years later, after he had died. In a room, he was the center of it, ironic, brilliant, funny, controlling, good-looking, with gobs of endless taste. He was to be reckoned with, yet after he died, we see him more clearly; he was clearly a bully seeking attention at any cost, yet with this legacy that was nothing short of amazing.  Like most of us, a perfect gentleman with the lights on, in private, much different and more human, flawed, vulnerable, a performer and amazing at it. We had our moments with Ginsburg, yet I clearly listened a lot when with them, yet they both were an incredibly valuable experiences of improvement, & performance.

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The Factory on 14th: Andy was one of the most incredible people of the 20th century. Imagine depigmentation, acne, blotchy skin, and twitching to help with your insecurities? And yet, rising to the pinnacle of social acceptance, in a diapers since his shooting in 68. The absolute balls at the height of Abstract Expressionism to deliver POP as a movement & get away with it on a worldwide scale. All while saying little, letting others deliver his lines. I would see Andy each evening on his way back to his 57 & 66th street Madison house unwinding. Madison Avenue really was the center of the earth, where you didn’t need a bodyguard; it was a peaceful walk of window shopping, as he, we would walk the entire 45 blocks unwinding. Another workaholic on speed, no less. He used his softness as a weapon. Andy would hit on me relentlessly, inviting me up into his place. "Um, no" and "Um, yes".

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COLOR THEORY: Grey, the forgotten color.

ZONE SYSTEM : What is middle grey ? Middle values ? Most people are horrendous with color.

We are not Rainbow Bright dolls.    Monochromatics!

OF COURSE I PLAN THINGS:  Are you Michelangelo ?

         I generally plan 4 steps ahead . Why ? Because I like to know where I am going, I am not a visionary.

         I also like the intensity of a job well done.

         Resolving questions that arise all the time.

         Seeing if it has legs, lasting abilities.

. . . and if it fails, I move onwards with no remorse. I am never married to it. 

DEADLINES: Deadlines will teach you much about your abilities, to not treat it like it is the holy grail, but it is just a job that you happen to do well.

         To be efficient, stop the bullshitting, get to the point.

MANIFESTOS: I like manifestos; there's nothing like a blueprint. They are from the heart, they are also the blueprint from which we direct our paint, & create ideas.

BULLSHIT: Bullshit deserves bullshit, learn how to play poker and protect yourself.

MENTORING: Michelangelo had one. We all think that we are smarter than our teachers, so we will only listen to half of what they say, which is why mentoring goes on for years, with stubbornness. If we were any good to begin with, we'd be rich. 

SIZE MATTERS: Of course, size matters. Making art is an investment; it should hurt. Yet we will work up to bigger things over time.

COMMISSIONS: Once you get good enough, commissions take time. Probably the worst thing is listening to the client. On this alone, I will charge double, yet they want to feel like this is their creation. You will get a headache, but they will both be happy.

HOW TO SMOOSE : You're kidding, right ?

Identity Art/ Politics  Dean Kissick  It's well-meaning, yet does it inspire more harm than good, as in helping MAGA to identify more than it aims to help? It is exclusionary at best. The content, we are looking at ways to disassociate, to look at our differences when we should be looking at what we have in common.