Imagine a poet who spends too much time trying to stick to the meter, a writer who overuses purple prose, a musician who plays a piece well but without emotion, or a painter who is preoccupied with exactly replicating the reference.
Their creations would be technically advanced, but lacking in beauty.
What would be the word to describe those people or their work that acknowledges the "technically advanced" part?
There is no single term.
We could talk of perfunctory perfomances for the musician.
For the painter we might talk of an artist (just) going through the motions (Collins), or painting in a mechanical manner.
A poet's work characterized by the rigidity of the poetical form and a poor content could be characterized as an artist given to sterile formalism.
A poet whose workis characterized by the rigidity of the poetical form at the detriment of the content can be said, among other things, to be prisoner of his technique.
Workmanlike
"competent and skillful but not outstanding or original. an adequate … reporter who turned out workmanlike copy." Merriam Webster
Both the creator of the piece and the resulting piece itself could be described as austere:
[Merriam-Webster]
3 : markedly simple or unadorned
// an austere office
// an austere style of writing
4 : giving little or no scope for pleasure
// austere diets
The artist (or the art) is technically proficient, but lacking in passion or any additional personal touches that would signal something truly individual or even creative.
How about technician, used in a pejorative sense? From Lexico:
technician: A person skilled in the technique of an art or craft. E.g., ‘The junior leading men, admirable technicians to whom the notion of charisma is alien, don't appear destined for stardom.’
Dali, for example, was a superb technician, but many feel his art lacks soul. There are many good writers who are superb technicians, but who will never be great novelists. Etc. I have often seen and heard technician used in a derogatory sense to convey the idea that So-and-so is highly skilled in the technique of their art or craft, but it ends there. They will never be great. There's something lacking. They are mere technicians.
