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There is a case to be made that AI-generated art and human-made art are fundamentally different, not just in how they’re created, but in what they mean. While AI relies on algorithms, data, and pattern recognition to generate works, human art emerges from lived experience, emotion, and intent. Machines can replicate styles and produce visually striking works, but they lack the consciousness to infuse their creations with personal narrative, cultural context or emotional resonance.
Mau, Founder of Sogni.ai, a Fortify Labs 2025 cohort project, shares his perspective on this evolving landscape. A seasoned full-stack CEO, Mau brings a deep passion for Web3, AI, and decentralization. Beyond tech, he’s also an artist at heart, holding a Bachelor of Arts from the Rochester Institute of Technology. In a time when AI art is met with skepticism and resistance, Mau explores why he chose to build Sogni and how he believes technology can deepen, rather than diminish, the creative spirit.
In collaboration with Sogni.ai, TZ APAC is also launching “Prompted by Imagination”, an arts competition inviting artists to explore and express their emotions, ideas, and perspectives on the evolving dialogue between AI-generated and human-made art with a prize pool nearing USD $2,000.
When I think about A.I. art versus human art, I actually think it’s the same thing. All A.I. has been trained on human data with a goal of giving the end user what they want. For me, it’s an idea factory in that you have a vision in your head ultimately, and you’re trying to capture that on the screen. And you have essentially, you know, ten assistants to get you there.
I also think that A.I. art is human art because it was created by people. In fact, if you look at all the rich and famous artists like Michelangelo, Picasso and Dale Chihuly — as they got older, richer and more famous, when they weren’t able to create art anymore, they had five or ten assistants that they guided into creating more art because they literally wanted to create art until they die
There’s also the talk of when the electric guitar came out, they say they killed the (acoustic) guitar. When drum machines came out in electronic music, there’s this quote by Björk, one of the first real popular electronic music artists, who gave a fitting response when asked if she thought about people saying that electronic music has no soul. She said that electronic music has no soul if you don’t put it in there, and so I really liked her response in that A.I. art has a soul, if the person creating the work puts it in there.
I think it’s natural to be cynical of any new technologies, especially with A.I., and also the amount of what we call “A.I. slop” out there. But what’s really happening is people are really experimenting and learning. And I think that if you see really amazing A.I., it wasn’t done in 5 seconds or 10 seconds. It was done in hours or days to accomplish a vision. And that’s the real big picture, it’s like people are constantly learning and growing with these things and soon you’ll be able to produce whole indie films by one person. It’s incredible what A.I. is enabling people to do.
With Sogni, we saw the opportunity to go past what we call casual prompting tools like MidJourney. We saw that open source AI is only 3 to 6 months behind the closed source stuff, all the innovation that’s happening. And so the two problems with open source AI is it’s hard to use, the UI-UX experience is not good and you’re limited by your own GPUs. With Sogni, we solve both those things for the user.
A good deal of it is what we call A.I. slop, but the top couple percent is insanely good work. These artists are showing what they’re really capable of, and it is a little bit of an uphill battle to show the world how incredible A.I. is. For me, it’s like having ten different A.I. artist assistants helping you with your work. Ultimately, you have a vision in your head and you’re trying to get it down on paper and Sogni provides you the tools to do that – really easily, really cheaply and really fast.
So it’s just going to open up freedom of expression to the max. Sogni is different from the other A.I. tools out there, in that we provide this Decentralized Physical Infrastructure Network (DePIN) protocol we call our “people-powered network”. The Sogni Supernet of 800 plus nodes around the world will help you create work cheaper, faster and more parallel.
We can do 16 images in under 5 seconds - that’s unheard of in the Web2 space. MidJourney to this day will give you four images every 50 or so seconds. We can render images faster than you can review them. So again, it’s like an ideation factory in a way where you can just accomplish so much in so little time.
Sogni, an AI-powered art generation platform, joined the Fortify Labs 2025 cohort earlier this year and is now set to enter the Tezos ecosystem through an integration with Etherlink.
Today, the word “prompt” instantly evokes the image of an AI command, a line of text sparking machine-generated output. But long before algorithms, prompts came from within: a fleeting thought during a walk or a dream just before waking. These were the original sparks of creativity - organic, human, and unprogrammed.
From 28th may - 11 June, this competition challenges artists to reclaim and redefine what it means to be ‘prompted’ - a call to artists to reimagine the meaning of a prompt.
Participants are invited to create and share their artistic interpretation of the theme “Prompted by Imagination”, using AI-generated art, hand-drawn work, or a blend of both. Let the theme speak to you - whether emotionally, philosophically, or creatively - and bring that vision to life. To enter the competition, follow these steps:
The form submission is to ensure we capture all entries and don’t miss any of your amazing creations!
Please note: All submissions must be original works created specifically for this competition. Previously minted or sold pieces will not be eligible. If you participate in this competition, you agree to all the Terms and Conditions as stated here.
Artworks will be open to the community where they can support their favourite artworks through likes and retweets, but final winners will be selected by our judges, Mau himself and AmirMushich, who was an art director of a major NFT launch in collaboration with Warner Music Group and Binance and is now the founder of ArtChains. After the competition closes, five standout submissions will be chosen by 15th June 2025 based primarily on their relevance to the theme “Prompted by Imagination.”
Prizes (in Tez equivalent):
🥇 1st Place – USD $500
🥈 2nd Place – USD $350
🥉 3rd Place – USD $200
🏅 4th Place – USD $150
🏅 5th Place – USD $100
If selected as one of the five winners, you’ll be asked to mint one edition of your artwork to TZ APAC, which will then be included in the Season 6 prize pool of TZ Apex.
In addition to the top five, we’ll also recognize 15 honorary mention artists, whose work will be considered for acquisition by TZ APAC (up to 30 tez per artist). To be eligible, these pieces must be minted on a Tezos or Etherlink marketplace of your choice.
Participating in Prompted by Imagination is like running a marathon. It is not the end of completing the marathon. It's how you have changed by the end of it. When you enter this contest, you're participating with other artists in a dialogue about what good art is. You're learning from each other and growing. And in the end you're better for it. - Mauvis Ledford, Founder of Sogni
Prompted by Imagination is just the beginning of your immersive journey with projects building on Tezos and Etherlink.
With nearly 3,000 tez distributed and over 1,200 participants in TZ Apex Season 5, Season 6 is packed with bigger rewards, more gachas and more interactive quests.
Stay tuned to TZ APAC’s X, you won’t want to miss this.
