2026 Is the Year of the Artist (And It’s About Time)
2026 is shaping up as the year of the artist. As audiences grow skeptical of AI-made ads, brands are crediting creators to rebuild trust, credibility, and creative differentiation.
For a long time, advertising worked like this: the work traveled fast, the brands took center stage, and the people who actually made it stayed somewhere off-screen.
Studios rarely tagged. Artists credited only when someone asked. It wasn’t malicious, it was just how the system worked.
Today, that system doesn’t quite work anymore. We live in an age where digitally crafted ads are met with instant skepticism. When something looks too smooth, too polished, too frictionless, the first reaction is often: this is probably AI. And for a lot of audiences, that assumption still carries a negative charge
In that environment, anonymity becomes a liability. Being explicit about who made something now functions as proof. Authorship has become part of the value.
What Changed?
The last year made one thing impossible to ignore: feeds are full, fast, and increasingly hard to tell apart. AI didn’t create that problem on its own, but it accelerated it, and everyone feels the fatigue.
In response, brands didn’t pull back from technology. They did something more interesting. They started leaning into authorship.
This past holiday season was a clear signal.
Intermarché leaned into animation and storytelling for its Christmas film, developed with its longtime agency partner BETC. The result didn’t read like “content” — it played like a short film with a clear creative point of view. The campaign spread far beyond social, went viral, and was picked up by major newspapers and trade press.
Porsche followed a similar instinct with its illustrated holiday film, created by Parallel Studio. Just as important as the look was the way the work was shared: the studio wasn’t hidden. It was part of the story.
Then there was Chanel, which released a mixed-reality campaign directed by Gordon von Steiner combining illustrations by Sarah Martinon and VFX — a technically complex piece that didn’t try to disguise its construction. Instead, the craft was visible, layered, and openly credited, positioning the blend of techniques as a feature rather than something to smooth over.
Outside the holiday window, the same pattern showed up elsewhere.
Rimowa and Burberry both leaned into classic illustration styles — work that could have been replaced by faster, cheaper solutions, but wasn’t. The choice itself became the message.
Where 2026 Lands
So 2026 doesn’t feel like a rejection of AI, and it doesn’t feel like a return to “how things used to be” either. It feels more like a recalibration.
Brands are still moving fast, but they’re more conscious of what they put into the world. They’re more open about how work is made, who shaped it, and why it looks the way it does. Artists aren’t hidden in the background anymore — they’re part of the narrative.
And that visibility changes things. For creatives, it builds recognition and trust. For marketing teams, it adds credibility in a landscape where sameness is the real risk. For audiences, it makes the work easier to connect with, because it feels authored rather than assembled.
If anything, that’s what defines this moment. Not the tools, not the platforms, but a renewed focus on intention. On people. On the idea that good work still comes from someone choosing to care.
