Steve Gleason, Football Icon With ALS, Finds Creative Outlet In AI Art

Before he was diagnosed with ALS in 2011, former pro football player Steve Gleason filled sketchbooks with his black-and-white graffiti drawings. The The progressive neurodegenerative disease has robbed the NFL alum of muscle function, so he can no longer wield a pencil. But it is experiencing a vibrant artistic renaissance through artificial intelligence.

The AI-generated art from his “Resilient Spirit” series, now on display in New Orleans, explodes with vivid color and symbolism. In “No Tree Can Grow to Heaven, Unless Its Roots Reach to Hell,” named for Gleason's cue, a tree's roots reach out into the orange and yellow magma of Earth, while a soft, dreamlike sky traces its trunk and its crown. In another image, “Reaching Out to Catch the Sun Rays,” a figure stands beside the sun, looking up from a swirling, richly saturated landscape that could be mistaken for something Vincent Van Gogh painted.

Gleason, 47, created digital images of his sketches using Adobe's Firefly generative AI toolset and entering text prompts via an eye-level “keyboard” attached to his wheelchair which turns eye movements into words. Adobe gave Gleason early access to Firefly, including a feature that allows it to “learn” from its prior art.

“I can see this technology helping so many,” Gleason, a former New Orleans Saints safety, said in a statement. “This is a conduit for self-expression, providing opportunities for creation and contribution to countless people who previously felt such possibilities were out of reach.”

Gleason is well known and loved in The Big Easy, where he played one of the most memorable plays in New Orleans Saints history. It led to a victory in the first home game after Hurricane Katrina, a victory that lifted a beleaguered city.

“Resilient Spirit” premiered Thursday at a private event attended by more than 80 guests at the headquarters of the creative collective Nieux Society, where the works will be on display on large monitors until the end of the month.

“Images are like poems,” Lindsey Roussel, co-founder and managing partner of the Nieux Society, said in an interview. “You can feel the excitement.”

Nieux helped spearhead the exhibit as part of a larger push to inspire others with ALS to access their creativity. The project is the result of a collaboration between Adobe and Team Gleason, a non-profit organization founded by Gleason and his wife Michel to empower and support people living with the disease. The arts initiative is expected to culminate in a global exhibit featuring ALS artists and supporters at the 2025 Super Bowl in New Orleans.

“I hope the 'Resilient Spirit' collection will inspire others to use new tools to make their visions a reality,” said Gleason. Roussel and Adobe's Adam Wood made minor formatting tweaks to Gleason's works, but athelte drove the creative process. “He was the lyricist and the composer and Adam and I were just the backing band,” Roussel said.

Generative AI continues to provoke a range of reactions, from enthusiasm for the tools' creative potential to worries about stealing the work of artists to form AI datasets or that algorithms will steal the jobs of creative But Gleason's AI-generated work exemplifies the promising ways technology can unlock creative expression for those living with disabilities.

“As much as photographers and artists are concerned about our copyright being violated and our work being used in AI training without our permission, see Steve's AI works and talking with him about how (the meditation tradition of) Dzogchen and Buddhism in general shapes his use of AI tools was a heart-opening experience,” wrote New Orleans artist Thomas Laird on LinkedIn after attending the event.

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis causes motor neurons in the brain to degenerate, eliminating the ability to move, speak and breathe, while generally leaving intelligence and memory intact. Addressing the crowd at the art opening in a computerized voice similar to that used by renowned theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking, who also had ALS, Gleason said he has always seen himself as an artist and that creativity has the power to encourage those who have had ALS. received the devastating diagnosis.

“Until there is a cure for ALS, technology-driven creativity is the cure,” he said. “The only limit is our collective imagination.” (Hear his remarks here.)

Gleason's Memoirs An Impossible Life Living with ALS: Finding Peace and Wisdom within a Fragile Existence premieres on April 30, co-authored with New Orleans Times-Picayune sports columnist Jeff Duncan.

“I may not be able to do things the same way I did before ALS,” Gleason said at last week's event, “but life, communication and creative expression are still possible.”