Austin visual artist Taylor W. Rushing is a self-described “lifelong Willie superfan.”
He even has a Willie Nelson tattoo and a dog named Willie.
So when he saw the poster for Willie Nelson’s upcoming Fourth of July picnic, he was crushed to realize it used AI art instead of a design commissioned from a human artist.
Rushing decided to respond with an alternative poster of his own — both an act of protest and a loving tribute to a revered Texas singer, songwriter and icon he simply calls “our oracle.”
His “fan made” art features a young Willie in a cowboy hat smiling wryly in front of a microphone. Rushing’s vintage design is based on a reference photo from a 1977 catalogue called The Mystic Willie Nelson, and is done in homage to the art style of many of his 1970s concert posters. Classic Willie of the analog world.
Fittingly, Rushing shared his alternative on Instagram accompanied by a track from Willie’s 1974 album “Phases and Stages” — a lamentation titled “It’s Not Supposed to Be That Way.”
“When I see something, I try to say something,” Rushing told the Current in a phone interview. “Especially when it comes to artists I admire.”
Rushing has worked on numerous projects for Luck Reunion and other Nelson-adjacent organizations in the past and has been “very public” about his love of the musician. “So I was hurt and I was bummed out,” he said.
“This is a gig that I would have done for free had someone reached out to me,” Rushing added. “I was bummed that they hired a robot for free instead.”
Nelson’s annual Fourth of July event, a hallowed Texas tradition since 1973, is scheduled to take place this year at Germania Amphitheatre, an outdoor venue located at the Circuit of the Americas in Austin. Other than Shotgun Willie, the stacked lineup includes Billy Strings, Wilco, Sheryl Crow, Lukas Nelson, Margo Price and others. Tickets are on sale now through Ticketmaster.
Though Rushing would like to think Nelson wasn’t involved in the decision, it’s unclear who was behind the choice to use AI art— something widely derided for its perceived inauthenticity — for a singer-songwriter treasured for his authenticity. Still, Rushing’s been in the music industry long enough to know such a design has to change many hands before it gets the green light.
“I work with major label artists, and I know how many layers of people this stuff needs to go through to get approved,” Rushing said. “And I think that’s what’s most shocking to me is that multiple people said yes to this.”
The Current reached out to Blackbird Presents, the large-scale concert production company behind the event, for a comment on the decision to use AI art. However, we received no response by press time.
Increasingly, AI art has become prevalent on music industry show flyers and posters. While Rushing can see why bands — particularly those that don’t make a lot of money — might take the easy way out, he said the choice comes down to preserving a symbiotic relationship in the ever-evolving dialogue between music and visual art.
“The argument for AI is plain and simple, right? It’s free. And I think that more than anything, especially when you’re putting on a concert of this size, the bottom line is very important,” Rushing said. “And so I can certainly understand why people rationalize their decision to use AI, but I think at the end of the day, you really have to think about whose legacy you’re talking about and whose visual language you might be compromising.”
Beyond professing an undying love for Willie, Rushing believes the visual legacy of Austin is also worth protecting. That includes early Willie posters designed by artists tied to Armadillo World Headquarters such as Jim Franklin, Steve Brooks and Danny Garrett, who are major influences in Rushing’s style of thin single-lines and stippling.
“Willie has one of the best track records of using artists throughout his career,” Rushing said. “I mean, his posters from the early ’70s by a lot of the Armadillo Art Squad guys are some of the best posters in our history of American poster art.”
While San Francisco artists like the “Big Five” — Wes Wilson, Stanley Mouse, Alton Kelley, Victor Moscoso and Rick Griffin — are credited with creating the visual language of psychedelic rock posters, Rushing argues Austin was a nexus of its own visual tradition. In Austin’s singular milieu, cowboys and hippies mingled together, creating a folksy authenticity perfectly encapsulated in an artist like Willie.
That’s why Rushing described it as a “real drag” when he saw the obvious AI image of Willie Nelson flipping a hamburger, with his signature guitar Trigger erroneously displaying five strings and eight tuning pegs.
After initially sharing the AI poster online, almost all artists on the lineup had deleted it by Friday morning, save guitar virtuoso Billy Strings. However, he deleted it later in the day, replacing it with a hand-written rundown of the information on the flyer, without comment and without art — whether human or robot-made. Before its Friday afternoon removal, comments flooded in on the original post, decrying the use of AI to create the image.
“What happened to hand-drawn posters?” one Instagram user asked. Another took a plaintive tone with the comment, “Please God I do not want this in our community.”
Numerous commenters pointed Billy Strings instead to Rushing’s lovingly crafted alternative, which one user said was “much more outlaw than AI.”
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