Generative AI: Threat or Opportunity for Graphic Designers?
Astrid Kensinger
Chair of Graphic Design
Virginia Commonwealth University School of the Arts in Qatar (VCUarts Qatar)
The generative AI revolution has sparked many debates during the past few months over its impact on existing careers, from web developers and content managers to illustrators and even to customer service workers and financial advisors.
Of particular interest to the creative industry is the impact of image-generating tools on graphic artists and designers. The applications that have become widely available almost overnight have immediately been adopted for general use by the public. These tools help users build high-quality images of whatever they can imagine and describe, in a matter of seconds.
All that’s needed is to log on to platforms like Midjourney or Dall-E and provide a detailed text prompt. With recent enhancements to these platforms, users can now modify their own uploaded images or incorporate some of their elements into images generated by the platforms. These rapid advancements have prompted experts to consider potential impacts on fields like graphic design.
In this article, we explore the potential threats and benefits of Artificial Intelligence on the graphic design field, with Astrid Kensinger, Chair of Graphic Design at Virginia Commonwealth University School of the Arts in Qatar (VCUarts Qatar).
VCUarts Qatar, inaugurated in 1998, was the first American university to open its doors in Qatar Foundation’s Education City. It offers academic programs in the arts, with a focus on liberal arts and sciences, and over the past two decades, has significantly contributed to the diversification and vibrancy of Qatar’s labor market, producing a cadre of talented fashion designers, art historians, painters, graphic designers, printmakers, and interior designers. The University works in close collaboration with its main campus, VCUarts Richmond, through semester exchange programs, shared courses, conferences, event programming, and arts research.
Interestingly, Kensinger isn’t overly concerned about the emergence of AI tools. “Image-generating AI programs may have proven that they can create visually interesting content, but they are not yet capable of doing the wide-ranging, complex work of graphic designers. These programs can fall under the realm of art or illustration, whereas graphic design is a much wider field that encompasses various dimensions, including 2D, 3D, and 4D design, as well as spatial design, wayfinding, exhibition design, and information visualization. Graphic designers are visual communicators with a distinct set of skills and responsibilities,” she explains.
The graphic design curriculum at VCUarts Qatar emphasizes collaboration, research, practical experience and cultural literacy. Students are encouraged to work manually and experiment for a comprehensive learning experience, involving both computers and hands-on work. They work in the wood shop, the fab lab, and the flex lab. They use tools like power drills and work with 3D printers. All these areas are outside the domain of AI. This constantly evolving manual, technical, and physically adaptive approach fosters a balance between tradition and innovation in creative education.
“While AI may have advanced in many areas, it has not yet matched the human ability to create immersive, sensory-rich experiences through touch, taste, and smell. Graphic designers use their hands and a deep understanding of materiality to construct meaningful designs, making this territory uniquely human and essential in the field. The human side is also essential for aspects like understanding clients’ needs, collaborating, understanding complex design problems, and providing visual solutions for them,” she said.
Cultural literacy is also an important point to consider when we discuss the work produced by AI. Graphic designers’ work is all about their personal narratives or local context, and AI is showing limitations when it comes to this. Images generated by AI have been roundly criticized for their lack of inclusivity and diversity. Most of the images are typical, especially in terms of beauty standards for females. This is no surprise, as AI primarily remixes and samples from existing databases, and there is a lack of digitized material that represents some cultures, including the Arab culture.
Dr. Kensinger understands that what we are experiencing is just the beginning and that the impact of AI on the graphic design industry is inevitable, but she is confident that there will always be ways to overcome any challenges. “This industry has proved throughout history its ability to adapt and evolve over time. It has existed for centuries. Look at the historical shifts such as the transition from handwriting to the printing press. Jobs were lost but new ones emerged,” she explains.
She believes that graphic designers will need to be familiar with AI because it will probably change some job roles and speed up certain processes. This belief in, and acceptance of, AI’s emerging prominence has made her keen on helping her students engage with these new tools, without compromising their creativity. For instance, her students recently worked on projects that involved creating work through Midjourney while adding inputs that reflected their knowledge and experiences. The results were highly impressive, but Kensinger is confident that a graphic design expert can notice the elements created with the help of AI.
Kensinger agrees that, while AI can be another instrument in graphic designers’ creative toolkit, they must understand that it will never produce precisely what they are imagining, no matter how proficient they become with text prompts.
“After all, whatever AI tools produce is big data’s response to their words and input. It will be missing human creativity and strategy which will always remain an essential aspect of the graphic design field,” she explained.
“One of the beauties of creativity is found in experimentation, where breakthroughs often manifest through a happy accident. A mistake can unexpectedly open a fresh perspective, giving you a novel way to visualize or create. So, if you rely solely on existing data from a database of tried or already documented work, these happy accidents won’t manifest,” she said.
So, how should graphic design students deal with emerging AI tools? Kensinger has the following advice to them: “Explore what can be achieved with these tools and become proficient in using them, but also make sure to understand their limitations. For instance, they can offer you a range of possible directions to explore or accelerate some design processes to allow quicker creative iterations.”
“In addition, always remember to switch off and immerse yourself in the world outside for inspiration,” she concluded.
