Fine art is a matter of nuance, so in that sense I think it does matter that a lot of the "human art" examples are aggressively cropped (the Basquiat is outright cut in half) and reproduced at very low quality. That Cecily Brown piece, for example, is 15 feet across in person. Seeing it as a tiny jpg is of course not very impressive. The AI pieces, on the other hand, are native to that format, there's no detail to lose.

But those details are part of what make the human art interesting to contemplate. I wouldn't even think of buying an art book with reproductions of such low quality--at that point you do lose what's essential about the art work, what makes it possible to enjoy.

That’s a great point, in a similar vein I routinely see people post photos on social media taken with their phone, side by side with a photo taken by a high end camera, saying “I bet you can’t tell the difference, expensive cameras are a waste of money when phones are so good”.

Well of course, you’re comparing 1.5 megapixels compressed JPEGs. If you display those photos on a large monitor - let alone print them - the differences will be immediately obvious.