Collaboration of Artists and AI: Mastering and Organizing Symbiotic Alterity

While recent artificial intelligence (AI) advances in art promise to boost productivity in creative industries, the threat of talent substitution is growing. Based on this paradox, this research seeks to understand the evolving collaborations between AI and creative profiles. It draws on a qualitative analysis of a dataset combining observations and interviews of 47 creatives profiles in architecture, fine arts and publishing, engaged in co-creative processes with AI systems. A key contribution of the study lies in the concept of symbiotic alterity which emerges from the data to describe how artists experience AI as a familiar ‘other’—an agentive partner whose difference is not only technological but relational and generative. Symbiotic alterity requires mastering a combination of both control and distancing towards AI tools to generate a fruitful dialogue. The notion of symbiotic alterity opens new perspectives for managing AI-augmented expert work, suggesting that productive human–machine collaboration relies not only on technical integration, but on cultivating relational awareness and co-adaptive practices. Thus, organizing human-machine collaboration does not only mean mastering AI tools, but also staging this expertise to demonstrate to the audience its impact on value creation.