Branding in Asia: How Can Creatives Lead in an AI World?

Kathryn Shannon Sim of LASALLE College of the Arts, University of the Arts Singapore, on how educators can help emerging creatives develop the judgment to direct AI with intention, and the five capabilities she sees becoming increasingly important.

I was recently discussing a project with a student who had first manually created a collage to bring together her vision for a series of fashion images for her graduation project. She then used this collage as the visual reference to prompt a generative AI tool, not simply to produce a final image, but to rapidly test how her original vision might translate into different visual possibilities.

What interested me was not the speed at which the images were generated, but what happened next. The student began questioning the images. She raised several questions in my discussion with her, such as: Which reflected the cultural context of the project? What should be retained, discarded, or reworked by hand? She had a clear methodology that guided her creative process and use of the generative AI tool.

That conversation stayed with me because the most important creative act was not in generating the images. The student had already conceived the idea, constructed its visual language and made the initial creative decisions before AI entered the process. The technology allowed her to explore possibilities more rapidly, but she still had to decide what was worth pursuing.

Beyond the prompt

Just five years ago, testing that many visual possibilities would have required considerably more time and technical production. Today, generation can happen almost instantly. However, judgment cannot.

Touchdown. A tired but excited bunch at the Fukuoka Airport.

It was a reminder that our role as educators is no longer simply to teach students how to use generative AI. Many are already experimenting with it. Hence, our key responsibility is to enable them to develop the critical judgment that allows them to direct the technology with intention, rather than simply follow what it produces.

Throughout history, major technological shifts, from photography and synthesizers to digital editing software, have been met with fears that technology would diminish traditional craftsmanship. Yet these technologies did not eliminate artistry. They changed where craftsmanship was expressed.

Generative artificial intelligence (AI) is another such turning point. Singapore’s move to build AI skills into education from 2027 is therefore neither surprising nor overdue. For aspiring creatives, the more pressing question is no longer how to use these tools, but what comes after the prompt: what must they learn that AI cannot decide for them?

The value of craft is moving upstream

The role of the creative professional is shifting. The creative is no longer necessarily the person who makes every individual asset. Increasingly, they are the person who understands why something should be made, for whom and what it should mean.

This also changes how we think about value in the creative industries. When AI can produce an increasing volume of content quickly, the value of creative work cannot rest solely on the labor required to produce it.

We are already seeing this reflected in conversations with industry. Employers are increasingly interested in graduates who can move between creative, strategic and technological contexts rather than operate within a single narrowly defined role. The ability to generate an image or execute a piece of content remains valuable, but so is the ability to interpret culture, understand audiences, articulate a point of view and connect creative decisions to a wider brand or business objective.

Take the fashion and media landscape, for example. Traditional publishing models are giving way to broader ecosystems built around communities, experiences, partnerships, intellectual property and cultural relevance. At the same time, AI is transforming how content is produced and distributed, while audiences increasingly seek meaning, trust, identity and connection.

This shift is reshaping the talent the industry needs. Editors are becoming cultural strategists, marketers are becoming community builders, and content creators are becoming narrative architects. As technical execution becomes increasingly automated, value will lie in the ability to read cultural and behavioral shifts, connect disciplines and translate those insights into meaningful narratives, experiences and communities.

Nurturing the creative voice

This philosophy is reflected in how we nurture our students at LASALLE College of the Arts, University of the Arts Singapore. We encourage them to experiment with AI, but place equal emphasis on critique, peer discussion, studio conversations and iterative feedback.

Across the BA (Hons) Fashion Media and Industries curriculum, we have been embedding emerging technology and AI into both creative and strategic practice, rather than treating AI as a standalone technical subject.

For example, in an industry project with an eyewear design and production company, students explored the development of new eyewear concepts, using AI as part of their process to interrogate ideas, research audiences and consumer behaviors, and visualize and test different creative and product directions before bringing them back into the studio for critique and further development.

The important part comes afterwards. Students must defend their choices. Why this direction and not another? What has technology overlooked? Does the outcome respond meaningfully to the intended consumer and cultural context? Where is the student’s authorship visible? And, most importantly, would the work be actually stronger without AI?

This shifts the emphasis from demonstrating that a student can use AI to demonstrating that they know when, why and how to use it. The technology becomes one component within a much larger process involving research, experimentation, critique, industry collaborations and human judgment.

This matters because art has never been solely about producing an outcome. It is also about observing, questioning, and gradually developing a creative voice. Those experiences shape not only the work, but the person behind it. AI does not make these experiences less important. If anything, it makes them more so.

The future of design

So where do we go from here? In my view, there are five capabilities that will become increasingly important.

The first is critical judgment. When AI can generate hundreds of possibilities, knowing which ones are relevant becomes a creative skill in itself. Creatives need to distinguish between what is technically impressive and what is genuinely meaningful.

The second is cultural intelligence. AI can identify patterns in existing data, but it does not genuinely understand cultural nuance or local sensitivities. Creatives must therefore become stronger interpreters of culture, ensuring their work remains relevant and authentic to the communities they engage.

The third is ethical and responsible practice. As AI-generated content becomes more widespread, questions of copyright, intellectual property, transparency and bias will become increasingly central to professional practice. Knowing when to use AI, and when not to, is equally important.

The fourth is interdisciplinary collaboration. Creative professionals will increasingly work alongside technologists, data specialists and marketers. The ability to communicate across disciplines and contribute to complex problems will matter as much as expertise within a traditional creative discipline.

Finally, there is creative curiosity and lifelong learning. Rather than mastering one platform, aspiring creatives need the confidence to experiment and adapt as technology changes. Those who thrive will not necessarily be those who know everything today, but those who know how to keep learning tomorrow.

Ultimately, the industry doesn’t just need people who know how to prompt. As technology increasingly helps us to produce output, education must give emerging creatives the space to consider what is worth making, why it matters and how it should exist in the world.

Kathryn Shannon Sim is Programme Leader, BA (Hons) Fashion Media and Industries, at LASALLE College of the Arts, University of the Arts Singapore.

Source: Branding in Asia. Permission required for reproduction. Access the original story here.