More popular than Picasso and Leonardo Da Vinci among AI artists, Greg Rutkowski opted out of the Stable Diffusion training set. The community just created a LoRA to mimic his style.
•
Lykon, the genius behind the first customized SDXL model, justified the move.
"Since this artist name was one of the most used in 1.5 prompts and now it's gone, I thought it was a good idea to train a LoRA," he wrote on Civitai.
The move wasn't without controversy. There was some debate in Civitai and Reddit with users arguing for both sides of the coin. "It's kinda messed up to make a LoRA of someone that specifically asked people not to train on their art," one wrote. "Legal doesn't always mean ethical."
Others sided with Lykon, alluding to the fact that Rutkowski's art has already been in circulation in SD1.5 for years. Others simply responded to the whole thing with humor.
While Lykon maintains he'll readily concede to Rutkowski, he said he believes he is acting on behalf of the greater good.
“If he contacts me asking for removal, I'll remove this.” Lykon said. “At the moment I believe that having an accurate immortal depiction of his style is in everyone's best interest.”
As the world of AI and art continues to evolve, the line between innovation and infringement becomes blurrier—especially when words like “styles,” “decentralization,” and open source come into play. The only certainty? The art community isn't shy about shaking up the digital canvas.
In the dynamic interplay between artists and AI, sometimes life does imitate art—and vice versa. If Rutkowski can't beat them, maybe he could just… paint them?
