Online discourse erupts after an artist claims her client used AI to modify a commissioned piece despite clear instructions not to do so.

THE topic of respecting an artist’s wishes when it comes to their finished artwork, particularly in relation to artificial intelligence (AI), has sparked online discourse.

A local artist recently vented her frustrations after discovering that her artwork had been fed into an AI programme by a customer, despite her allegedly instructing them not to do so after handing over the piece.

An image attached to the post showed the artist’s finished black-and-white drawing transformed into a coloured version after the customer submitted it to an AI programme.

“Why commission me if you were expecting a coloured drawing, only to run it through AI later just to add colour?

“My art isn’t ‘just black and white’. I spent hours working on all the details based on what you asked me to draw, and this is how you repay that effort?” she said in a Threads post.

The artist was also irked by her work being described as a “sketch” rather than a finished piece.

Many netizens sided with the artist, agreeing that the customer had crossed a line and disrespected her boundaries.

“That was rude of the customer. They disrespected you as an artist,” one user said.

“Malaysians’ awareness of copyright in artistic works—and the dangers of this so-called ‘AI slop’—is really at a low level,” commented another.

 The Sun Malaysia