zlacker

It's an important distinction you make and hard to talk about without a vocabulary. The terms I've seen music historians use for this concept were:

- generic expression: commercial/pop/entertainment; audience makes demands on the art

- autonomous expression: artist's vision is paramount; art makes demands on the audience

Obviously these are idealized antipodes. The question about whether it is the art making the demands on the audience or the audience making demands on the art is especially insightful in my opinion. Given this rubric, I'd say AI-generated art must necessarily belong to "generic expression" simply because it's output has to meet fitness criteria.