Panelists at the BRICS+ Fashion Summit in Moscow engaged in a wide-ranging discussion on artificial intelligence this week. Under the banner “Artificial Intelligence in the Creative Process: Tool or Co-Author?”, designers, cultural advocates, and legal specialists from across the BRICS+ bloc and beyond convened to examine how generative AI is reshaping fashion, craft, and the legal frameworks governing creative work. What began as a dialogue on workflow and inspiration quickly expanded to encompass provenance, cultural protection, and the widening gap between technical capability and existing regulation.
New Delhi-based designer Kanika Goyal set the ethical tone, emphasizing human responsibility in decisions regarding AI-assisted output. “At the end of the day, it’s your call,” she asserted, arguing that the creative professional must decide “whether to reject the idea, to accept it, to edit, or to improvise.” She warned that if a creator simply accepts “the first choice that AI generates without even questioning it, then definitely the authorship has been passed on.”
Goyal likened AI to established tools such as cameras, Photoshop, or sewing machines. “If a camera is taking a photo, if Photoshop helps you to edit, if a sewing machine is helping you stitch, you do not give them that authorship for what they have not created,” she said. The distinction, she noted, lies in intention: “Authorship lies with you. You are the one who needs to take that decision.”
A perspective from the Seychelles framed AI as both a lifeline and a risk. “AI is definitely helping our young generation designers to design and communicate to a wider audience,” said Tery Carolo, CEO of Seychelles Fashion Week, while stressing the necessity of documenting work to preserve Creole heritage. “So, the process is very important for us,” he added, describing initiatives requiring designers to present research, color choices, and iterative steps when AI forms part of a workflow.
He illustrated this approach with a project where a decades-old family painting was digitized and printed on contemporary swimwear—”the original painting is being transformed onto the fabric”—a process blending manual craft, Photoshop, and selective AI use while maintaining visible provenance.
Legal and intellectual property concerns surfaced repeatedly. Daria Voinova, CEO of IPEX, a prominent Russian digital marketplace for managing and trading intellectual property, cautioned that models trained on massive datasets could replicate identifiable artisanal styles. This raises complex questions regarding ownership of the output and its eligibility for intellectual property registration.
While the panel did not reach a legal consensus, participants agreed on practical safeguards: document prompts and processes, establish provenance records, and develop industry norms to preempt costly disputes. As Voinova noted regarding practical safeguards, precision is paramount; more specific prompts and clearer documentation yield results that align more closely with creative intent.
Another recurring theme was cultural dilution. Several speakers warned that broad, uncurated training data risks flattening local aesthetics and erasing cultural specificities—a threat particularly damaging to crafts rooted in place-specific knowledge and ritual.
The session’s core message was clear: AI is neither a savior nor an inevitable usurper. It is a contested technology demanding new norms, education, and protective infrastructures. Until legal and ethical frameworks catch up, the final act of authorship remains fundamentally human.
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