And here we are, after months of generative euphoria and facing the relentless flood of images, videos, and new AI tools, a central question emerges: what if we’re not just consuming images but also admiring feats? As evidence, consider the overwhelmingly enthusiastic global reception of Intermarché's Christmas ad(1), which was traditionally animated, compared to the massive backlash against AI-generated campaigns by Coca-Cola or McDonald's(2). It suggests that amidst this glut, perhaps it’s the trace of human effort we are yearning to reconnect with.
From image-as-object to image-as-stream.
When discussing the nature of images and their transformations, it’s hard not to reference Walter Benjamin, who questioned nearly a century ago the status of images in the era of mechanical reproduction and theorized concepts like aura—the unique presence of an authentic work, its "hic et nunc" (here and now), essentially, its unique spatial-temporal anchoring that carries its history, the creator’s touch, the moment, the context, and the intention(3).
However, with generative AI, we're crossing an unprecedented threshold in the long history of images because, in this new paradigm, they shift radically, transforming the atelier into a flow, the "here and now" into "everywhere and right away," and aura into speed. The generated image no longer emerges from a creative "hic et nunc" but from a decentralized algorithmic process, floating in an unspeakable temporal and geographic space.
The erosion of attention.
We’ve been living in an image-saturated environment for a long time, and our attention is increasingly eroding in the face of this continuous stream, a sensation largely amplified since the advent of artificially generated images. This erosion perhaps reveals something essential buried beneath the flow—that part of our aesthetic pleasure comes from the awareness of human effort behind the images, the singularity, the effort made, the cultivated obsession, and the time invested in a vision. Because surely, we all need to admire effort as much as the result since we’re eager for behind-the-scenes glimpses, work in progress, studio visits, making-of processes, all elements that transform a piece into a human epic, revealing the sum of conscious decisions and limits transcended by the power of conviction.
So we realize that our desire is not only aesthetic but also probative. We don’t go to museums to witness miracles but to encounter proofs of commitment.
The absence of a witness.
Generative AI produces spectacle but not exploit; it shows us the result without the journey, the effect without the cause, magic without the magician, thus altering an essential dimension in creating a work—its testimonial dimension.
By "absence of a witness," we mean that a work generated by AI bears no trace of a lived human journey, it conveys neither personal history nor a long learning process, nor indeed does it testify to overcome failures or cultivated obsessions. An AI-generated work is merely a story without stories, where a work, in its primary sense, remains the witness of a particular human adventure, a conviction forged out of experience, indescribable to the naked eye but felt as an invisible signature, even though many artists and creatives put their lives, experiences, and visions at the service of AI to invent or confront new forms of visual writing. In the emergence of these new disciplines, the testimonial dimension shifts from the isolated image to the coherence of an approach, needing contextualization to be fully perceived and recognized. The challenge then becomes to make the journey visible, the persistent choice of prompts, the curation among thousands of variations, the construction of personal grammar in dialogue with the machine. Some creators are already on this path by treating AI not as a solution but as a productive constraint, and when the process is told, the image regains weight.
The ambitions of the image.
There is nothing inherently wrong with this mutation; we must simply acknowledge that two value regimes now coexist in the image-making system, not two levels of quality but two regimes of use with their own legitimacy, where one narrates and the other optimizes. And while AI logically excels in output, the image-as-object, it becomes scarce, regaining its symbolic value precisely due to its rarity.
Because not all images carry the same ambition or answer the same need, especially in the fields of Communication, where these two regimes coexist depending on the stakes: when it’s about quickly producing multiple versions, format adaptations, or variations on already established visual codes, AI finds its natural legitimacy by freeing creative teams from repetitive gestures and allowing them to explore more broadly, but when a campaign must carry a singular vision, embody brand conviction, or create an emotional breakthrough, it's the regime of the image-as-object that prevails, where the testimonial dimension becomes central again, where the sum of creative choices, strategic arbitrations, and artistic direction constructs this depth that makes an image not just inform but also mark.
Artistic direction itself evolves in this environment by balancing between the speed of systems and the slowness of convictions, deciding when output efficiency is enough and when it’s necessary to build proof of engagement. AI thus allows time to be freed in high-volume productions to invest more in projects where the testimonial dimension becomes a strategic issue, transforming this redistribution of creative time into a real stance, in which AI can play a different role, not as an end but as research material, a space for exploration, or a productive constraint.
Towards an economy of admiration?
Because when everything shines, nothing truly does, and when everything becomes possible, nothing truly surprises, we find that abundance without effort eventually loses its appeal, and our attention economy isn’t infinite, growing weary and becoming selective against the constant flow of generated content.
And while generative AI astonishes in its capability to simulate, reproduce, combine, it becomes less and less striking as the shock effect diminishes, no longer impressing—not because it lacks power, but because it cannot carry conviction—it feels nothing and proves nothing.
We may then be entering an era of admiration economy, not out of reactionary nostalgia but out of aesthetic necessity, where desire shifts from the finished product to the effort, from the spectacular to the feat, because while the spectacular captures attention, only feats build trust, and in a world saturated with signs, trust becomes the true rarity.
Located imperfection, assumed constraint, visible renunciation all become indicators of a human trace left behind, attested by the Naive Design trend, and it is here that difficulty becomes distinction again, not as fetish but as a condition for the emergence of meaning that transcends mere pleasure, where specialists embody what AI cannot simulate—intention forged through effort and carried by personal conviction.
We might be seeking less to see and more to believe.
AI doesn't remove intention; it takes away the default evidence, exploring, accelerating, multiplying, which makes it an incredible ally, but it doesn’t live through constraint or failure, doesn’t carry obsession, thus revealing the paradox of an innocence of power that forces us to reconsider what we truly seek in images.
The image doesn’t collapse; it shifts its center of gravity: flow thrives while the object becomes scarce, the spectacular wears thin while the probative gains value, and AI acts as a magnifying glass showing that we might be seeking less to see than to believe, less to consume than to admire.
Therefore, admiration, so uniquely human, can only emerge from the recognition of a journey marked by deep convictions because what truly matters is less about generation and more about testimony since when everything becomes possible, only the "human impossible" retains the power to amaze us.
Franck Luminier, Creative Director, Insign.
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This perspective intentionally focuses on the aesthetic and testimonial value of images. It leaves aside the widely documented debate, elsewhere, on the "reality" of images (deepfakes, truthfulness, authentication, traceability) so as not to confuse the question of meaning with that of mistrust.
(1) Agency Romance and Illogic Studios for Intermarché, 2025.
(2) In response to general uproar, McDonald's Netherlands withdrew its 2025 Christmas ad.
(3) Walter Benjamin, "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" (1935).
