Colleen Hoffenbacker Honored in Marquis Who’s Who in America: Pioneering Human Authorship in AI Art
Selected 2025 | Colleen Hoffenbacker’s inclusion in Who’s Who in America 2025 recognizes her contributions to contemporary art and her pioneering U.S. copyright for AI‑assisted works.Artist Recognition
Colleen Hoffenbacker, an AI-augmented painter, is recognized in Who’s Who in America for advancing hybrid visual creation through studio‑based inquiry and technological refinement. As the first painter to secure U.S. copyright for hand‑painted works created in collaboration with AI, she establishes an AI art precedent and affirms the applicability of existing standards to AI art copyright. Curated AI outputs, carrying stylistic DNA embedded through her vision, form the foundation of her process. She reshapes algorithmically inflected images into layered compositions, refracting floral realism through technological mediation and resolving them in oil to span the digital and the analog — showing how human authorship in AI art transforms what the algorithmic lens offers. The result is a luminous negotiation between inherited form and digitally conveyed attention in ways that are classically familiar yet distinctly modern. Her inclusion signals the growing visibility of artists shaping the next generation of AI‑assisted painting and materially resolved works in dialogue with computational practice in the emerging AI Era.
“[Hoffenbacker’s] work offers a material record of human agency and artistic innovation. By situating her practice within shifting boundaries of authorship shaped by AI, she invites museums and cultural institutions to recognize the long‑term archival and cultural value of acquiring works that reflect both legal precedent and painterly resolution.”
About the registry
Founded in 1899, Marquis Who’s Who has chronicled the lives and careers of accomplished individuals across a wide range of disciplines. Its registries are held in the collections of the Library of Congress and major academic institutions throughout the United States. The publication’s reputation for selectivity and historical significance was further underscored when it was chosen by the U.S. government to contribute to the National Millennium Time Capsule — commemorating individuals and institutions defining American life at the turn of the millenium.
artist statement
“I’m honored to be included in Who’s Who in America. This recognition affirms the value of hybrid creative practice — expanding meaning across mediums, visual traditions, and evolving methodologies.”
Press Release
See the Marquis Who’s Who official announcement for details.
Hoffenbacker joins the ranks of cultural icons in Who’s Who in America — a distinguished lineage that includes Taylor Swift, Oprah Winfrey, Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, and renowned artists Cindy Sherman, Jenny Holzer, Faith Ringgold, and Judy Chicago. Her inclusion signals a practice that expands creative boundaries within the evolving landscape of 21st‑century art.
