Some questions for AI Artists

I'm looking to open a discussion with anyone who actively and regularly uses AI for any creative endeavor. I am genuinely curious about these things. I'm not looking to start a fight, to nitpick, to harass, or to bitch. I want to understand your worldview. I plead the same from you; I am approaching you in good faith, and I deserve that same courtesy.

I am an artist. I have been for, genuinely, my entire life. I come from a family of artists of all kinds -- writer, musician, dancer, painter. I grew up very supported in my artistic endeavors from the get-go. As such, being an artist is foundational and I would even say intrinsic to my identity/sense of self. The ways in which being an artist affect my personality, my worldview, my experience in my day-to-day life cannot be explained concisely and efficiently -- it is an everpresent aspect of my personality and character.

I have grown up doing art. This phrasing is deliberate: I don't consider myself a person who generates a product, an endpiece, a goal. Rather, I instead see myself as a person engrossed in The Process, in the time and effort and blood and sweat and tears and etc etc etc. From where I'm sitting, you cannot be an artist without enjoying the effort it takes to create art. It is intrinsic.

I'm used to handling paper and different kinds of markers and paints and stamps and tape and scissors. When I make music, I feel the weight of my bass hanging off my shoulders, and the strings reverberating in my muscle and fat tissue. I give myself papercuts. I get ink smudged on my nose. There is a real and active feedback of making art that makes me feel really alive.

When I started drawing on the computer with a digital tablet, my family was really confused. Their initial questions were always along the lines of, "so it just does everything for you?" I see a similar thing happening with AI art.

When I started drawing on the computer with a digital tablet, I had a difficult time adjusting to the medium because there was very little tactile feedback. I had to get used to pressing buttons and a smooth screen rather than what was once a living thing scratching against another corpse, perhaps even the same corpse. I could only fall in love with it by finding the things that made that medium special and unique.

In retrospect, it was really easy to adjust to using a tablet because it used the same muscle memory as drawing on paper.

It is now my turn to be confused.

I don't understand how typing a prompt into, for instance, Gemini can be satisfying. Where is the tactile feedback? What effort is being exerted, and in what ways does the result make that effort feel worth it? Do you enjoy the effort itself?

I'm really confused about why you want to use AI rather than literally any other medium. What is it that makes this one thing in particular useful? What is unique and unreplicable about it, and -- perhaps most importantly -- why is that something you value?

I understand that you're a creative person. You wouldn't have the desire to make Anything if you weren't. If you really truly call yourself an artist, it must be because you want to make something simply for the sake of making it, because to do so fulfills the creative drive within you. Is generating art with AI fulfilling? is it satisfying? I deeply wish to understand how it possibly could be.

Finally, what are some things you wish traditional artists understood about AI in the context of generating art?

Thank you for your time.