you are not expressing yourself because you are not in control. AI is not expressing itself because it doesn't even know what a picture is. the result is an image devoid of expression. i recommend looking up The Chinese Room thought experiment.

AI is a black box. what it does between input and output is out of your hands and hidden. you are not creating. it takes your prompt, which it does not understand as words, compares it against billions of indexed data points, which it does not understand as images, and returns the "best match."

The worst thing to happen to academia was the emergence of a nomadic administrative class like the one in corporations who just move from institution to institution setting fires and walking away.

Say what you will about the flaws of faculty governance, but at least they believe in the mission.