Made by Me… or the Machine?” How Australian Artists Are Using AI – and Who (Legally) Owns the Work
While AI opens up new and exciting ways to create, it also raises tricky questions about ownership, originality, and copyright.
“Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist.” – Pablo Picasso
This quote rings especially true in today’s creative landscape, where Australian artists are pushing the boundaries of art with artificial intelligence (AI). While AI offers bold new ways to create, it also brings tricky legal questions around ownership, originality, and copyright.
As a copyright lawyer working with artists through my firm, I’ve seen firsthand how AI is being used in the studio. In this article, I explore the creative and legal tensions emerging from AI-generated work in Australia.
Let’s begin with Belinda Stanton, a Toowoomba, Queensland-based artist whose practice blends traditional painting with AI-generated imagery. Her work is emotionally resonant, conceptually layered, and visually rich. But what’s fascinating is that many of her pieces begin not with a brushstroke, but with a prompt typed into AI software like Midjourney.
Belinda recently shared her process with me. She uses AI as a conceptual springboard, not a final product. She generates multiple images using AI, collages them in Photoshop, and uses those compositions as reference material to inform her paintings.
As she explains it:
"I use AI-generated images in much the same way an artist might study horses to paint them — not to reproduce them, but to better understand and reflect on the subject."
She’s currently working on a series inspired by Walter Benjamin’s interpretation of Paul Klee’s Angelus Novus (1920). Belinda reimagines the angel through AI prompts and paints her own interpretation of how technology reshapes our view of history. The resulting artworks are deeply human, yet rooted in digital exploration.
Paul Klee, Angelus Novus (1920)
So what’s the legal position here?
Under Australia’s Copyright Act 1968 (Cth), copyright only protects “original” works — and crucially, those must be created by a human author.
This means that if an artwork is entirely generated by AI, with no meaningful human input, it may not attract copyright protection in Australia.
However, things get much more interesting and protectable, when the artist plays an active and deliberate role in shaping the output.
Back to Belinda Stanton, who doesn’t see AI as a tool to produce finished artworks, but as a way to generate fluid reference material.
She often creates multiple AI-generated images, cuts them up, collages them in Photoshop, and uses these compositions as starting points for painting. Individually, the images don’t carry specific meaning, but collectively, they allow her to explore and express complex ideas resulting in something conceptually rich and very human.
And that’s exactly what the law tends to protect, the human choices, edits, interpretation, and intention behind the process. The more the artist contributes creatively, the stronger the case for copyright ownership, at least that’s the way that the law stands today.
AI Angelus Novus, Belinda Stanton (2025)
Does this mean that artificial intelligence is neither artificial nor intelligent without human context? Maybe, maybe not.
Dr. Fei-Fei Li, Professor of Computer Science at Stanford and co-director of the Stanford Human-Centered AI Institute, has emphasised the importance of human context in artificial intelligence and says that AI should be designed to enhance human dignity, creativity, and well-being.
So, while AI may offer infinite possibilities, it’s the artist’s hand and mind that gives the work meaning, originality, and legal protection.
Keep an eye out for part two, where I will be exploring what artists can do to protect their rights, relevant court cases, and why the law still demands human touch.
Don’t Paint What You See, Belinda Stanton (2024)
Don’t Paint What You See by Belinda Stanton is an oil painting that beautifully illustrates her process of using Midjourney outputs as a springboard. It’s layered and intriguing — suggestive of her broader narrative approach.