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Abstract: Rapid advances in visual forms of generative AI have prompted disagreement about the nature, ethics and integrity of the new practices arising from uses of the technology. Correspondingly, scepticism is routinely expressed towards their prospects as art. Addressing worries about the use of copyrighted materials as training data, I look to appropriation art to argue that the concern underpinning much of the scepticism is whether the creator has acted for what might be termed “artistic reasons”. I disentangle what it means to act for “artistic reasons” in these practices and propose that a lack of trust, compounded by social media platforms, in image-makers to act with a commitment to these threatens aesthetic discourse about these practices.