The question surrounding Australia's Brisbane Portrait Prize is no longer simply whether AI belongs in an art gallery — it's about what happens when artists who once boycotted the competition choose to return and push back from within it.
That tension is especially evident in the 2026 finalist lineup, as outspoken critics of generative AI are exhibiting deeply personal, human-made work alongside one openly AI-assisted portrait, The Guardian reported.
Here's what to know
In 2024, the Brisbane Portrait Prize sparked controversy by permitting AI-generated submissions, even for the $50,000 Lord Mayor's prize.
That move led several past winners to boycott the award.
Wiradyuri artist Birrunga, a former Packer's Prize winner, was among those critics.
"An AI piece is not art. It's decoration, illustration at best. It doesn't have cultural content," he said, per the newspaper. He argued that allowing AI-generated work risked extracting First Nations cultural intellectual property.
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For the 2026 prize, though, Birrunga returned with five First Nations artists from his gallery. He explained that the group wanted to "reinsert ourselves" through self-portraits rooted in "ancestral integrity."
One finalist work captures that debate: Jackie Ryan's The Catch, which places Australian comedian Alice Fraser in a claw machine filled with figures made using the generative AI program Krea, as The Guardian detailed.
Of the 49 works in the main competition, Ryan's is the only one to declare generative AI involvement.
More background
For Kamilaroi artist Elysia Love-Anderson, the distinction is simple.
"AI cannot give a piece what we can. Knowledge that has been passed down from family, from elders, down multiple generations. It's just fake," Love-Anderson said, according to the paper.
Also returning as a finalist is photographer Glenn Hunt, who won the prize's digital category in 2020 and was a leading figure in the 2024 boycott.
His new portrait subject is Dean Clifford, who lives with epidermolysis bullosa.
"I still feel the same way about AI. But all I can do, in this instance, is create something that's the opposite to that," he said, per The Guardian. "You can't get more real than he is."
What's being done?
Rather than ban the technology, the Brisbane Portrait Prize is attempting to manage its use.
Director Anna Reynolds said entries using generative AI are accepted only if they do not breach copyright, a policy introduced to "get a handle" on the technology.
"I think the argument about yes or no is kind of gone now. There's more of a more sophisticated argument now, about how you use it as a creative tool," Reynolds said, as The Guardian reported. "It's about control, retaining the human capital, retaining the human creative control. That's what's important."
Gunggari and Kabi Kabi painter Kane Brunjes expressed a similar confidence.
"Regardless of AI, we've still got our integrity — and our artworks aren't going anywhere," Brunjes said. "Our stories aren't going anywhere."
Where can I learn more?
The dispute at the Brisbane Portrait Prize shows how artificial intelligence is reshaping creative work.
• At Christie's, its first all-AI auction intensified artists' backlash against machine-made work.
• Across the music industry, human artists are losing a staggering amount of income as AI slop spreads.
• For creative professionals, AI content copyright claims remain shaky, leaving many with little protection.
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