Is Digital Art Artificially Inflating Creators’ Skill?

We tend to hold in high esteem what is least accessible, and art isn’t an exception. 

The distinction between “fine” art and other art is difficult to define in a sentence, but probably exists as a solid line in the mind of the average person. Most folks will list traits like technical skill, aesthetic appeal, and style as essential features of “good” art. This probably leads many of those same people to erroneously conclude that a work that encapsulated all of those traits should be considered “fine” art.

While the definition of fine art is tenuous, the immense value of the art market is not. Millions of dollars exchange hands every year for work that is speculated to increase in value or for the work of blue—chip artists that investors believe will retain value. For that reason alone, nothing that passes through the art market could be considered anything other than “fine” art. 

One feature of fine art is that its intent is presumed to be contemplative rather than an appeal to general aesthetics. A second core feature of fine art is that it doesn’t serve a commercial purpose and—at least theoretically—isn’t produced for the intent to sell. As an extension of that expectation, much of what we consider “fine” art isn’t reproducible at scale. A painter can work on a single painting at a time, no more.

However, artists have previously forced us to reconsider this, as Andy Warhol did when he elevated silkscreen printing—a method of mass production—to the realm of fine art. His background in commercial illustration notably influenced his style, not only with his choice of medium but also in technical execution.

Nowadays, thanks to artists like Warhol, the average person intuitively understands that both commercial and fine art can be produced within the scope of a single medium.

High-quality cameras are available on most smartphones, and anyone can take a photo and throw it on social media or sell it online. And yet, we freely accept photographed images—often digitally enhanced and easily reproducible—on the walls of fine art galleries. Mastery over the camera and its accessories—including photo editing software like Photoshop and Lightroom —is considered a legitimate form of artistic expression rather than a cheat code masking a deficit of skill. 

The nature of photography upends conventional thinking about fine art as something that is contemplative and scarce. No one makes reductive arguments about photography, equating the skill of the person behind the camera to the mere “clicking of buttons” or “twirling of dials” without talent.

So why do we think of digital art any differently?

I keep having the same conversation in entirely different art circles. It goes something like this: 

“Digital art is easy because there are so many tools to assist the creator like line stabilization, the undo feature, and color adjustments! Digital artists do not develop technical skill because of these tools and so digitally created art is not skillful.”

It’s worth mentioning, since this apparently isn’t obvious to many, that the digital tools available on drawing programs are mimicry of tools that traditional artists use in real life: Mahl sticks for hand stabilization; rulers to draw straight lines; grid paper for perspective; camera lucidas to trace life; projectors to trace photos; masking fluid to preserve white space; turpentine and erasers to undo mistakes.

Who would question the skill of a traditional artist who created, say, an oil portrait, on the basis that these tools were merely available to them, regardless if the artist chose to use them or not? Disparaging the skill of the digital artist because of their tools—regardless if they used them—is clearly absurd.

However, let’s be clear that using those tools does not discredit the digital artist, either. Within a complex program like Photoshop or Clip Studio Paint, hundreds of tools exist within them that provide infinite opportunities for creative expression and stylistic choice that artists should celebrate. Without the power of choice, there would not be art.

Truthfully, I don’t think it’s just the existence of those tools that degrades people’s perception of digital art. Rather, online art communities are constantly inundated with digital art that is incompetent and leverages all of those tools… poorly. It's obvious when a rookie artist traces a photograph with shaky hands, color picks from the reference photo, drops the color in with fill, and grabs an airbrush to shade—usually with black. We’ve all seen this.

The point remains that beginner artists such as this had every digital tool at their disposal, and yet the final product was lackluster because they didn’t know how to use the toolkit skillfully, and they lacked an understanding of art fundamentals, and they lacked technical skill. This example perfectly encapsulates my answer to our original question, “Does digital art inflate the creator’s skill?”

My conclusion, as an artist who has a background in both digital and traditional art, is this:

Digital art can not inflate the skill of the creator beyond what they are already capable of producing. An artist’s knowledge of art fundamentals transcends the mediums they use.

But I want to go slightly beyond the original question (the post title) and ask, “Are novice artists the only reason this negative perception of digital art persists?” I don’t think so.

Returning to the concept of scarcity, many people who consume art revere traditional work because of its limited reproducibility, and the presumed level of technical skill to create such work is high. My anecdotal experiences with non-creators' perception of artwork echoes this sentiment as do my personal consumption habits.

When I buy work from other digital artists, the pieces are utilitarian: a deck of cards, a coaster, a mug, a bag, all with the artist’s designs transferred to these objects. But when I buy art for the sake of art, I never buy digital prints. I buy traditional work. I’m not trying to side-line digital art for superficial reasons—I respect digital art as a valid medium—but I personally find creating digital art is more appealing to me than consuming digital art.

Yet in conversations with traditional artists, there’s often an undercurrent of fear: the fear of being replaced. 

I think this fear is unfounded. Consumers of oil paintings have no interest in digital prints of made up characters and pretty Pinterest girls in fantastical landscapes. Consumers who buy fanart and tape it to their wall probably didn’t choose between that or a matted and framed watercolor landscape. The market for traditional art versus digital art is generally segregated. 

The competition between traditional and digital artists is unnecessary, but some artists have internalized the economic standards of the fine art market so thoroughly that they measure the intrinsic value of art—and their own value as an artist— according to the scarcity it is presumed to have.

The value of art isn’t in dollars or clicks, but the joy we take in creating it and viewing it.

Let us find joy in all art, digital or otherwise.