Best or First and In Between
Below you'll find the first part of a conversation initiated by Jerry Saltz on his FB profile. Jerry's 'salons' on FB are some of the most timely art dialogue out there... hence this post... and when I question the propiety and consider the topic, I couldn't resist. Enjoy.
Jerry Salz said:
Kirsten Rae Simonsen wants to talk about "artists stealing ideas from other artists." Okay, lets see if there's anything here. Obvioulsy, ALL ART comes from other art. So all art steals from other art. Kirsten must mean something diffe...rent. As a critic I'm very interested in who did what first; but really, I am more interested in who did what "best." Artists, you tell me.
Mark Shunney said
I found it interesting why James Turrell moved from LA to the desert. In his words- It was to get away from the gallery represented Robert Irwin.
Jerry Saltz
Of course, I have watched in art scholls where one students, say, starts using Cadmium Red Light and all of a sudden, like a virus, all of these other artists are using Cadmium Red Light. I never thoguht of this as "stealing." I always thought that it just meant that for whatever reasons Cadmium Red Light just made sense to people, and (you know me), that CRL ITSELF had a need to be seen. ??
And I read my own reviews and see dozens of ideas from dozens of places. So, I'm stealing, I suppose, all the time too.
AdrienneRose Gionta
recently this has been a hot topic around here as one artist directly copied exact imagery from another and tried to pass it off as her own. you can check out this blog for more details if you have the time or concern... i would luv to hear what you think!
Clayton Sean Horton
don't the best artists disguise their sources the best?
Jen Bradford
I agree with your criteria. Artists cannibalize everything, it goes with the territory. So I'd be curious to know what Kirsten had in mind. Not subject matter, surely - stealing what?
Brynna Kate Tucker
I think there is a difference between stealing and innovation. I'm not sure I'm as interested in NEW as I am in IMPROVED. Improved is a direct celebration of the original, but with a new approach or result. It recognizes the past, though and gives it a nod. Innovative ways of thinking, making, and seeing are what interest me in contemporary art... and design as well.
Clayton Sean Horton
yes, if i see anymore canned foam or beeswax in a mfa studio, i'm going to headbutt someone.
Zachary Ziemann
its all about stealing you just have to obscure your source
AdrienneRose Gionta
http://culturallysubvertingbedtimestories.blogspot.com/
here is some of the details about the battle between artists going on over here right now
Julie Tremblay
Didn't Picasso say: Bad artist borrow, good artists steal!"?
Bill Gusky
A sincere effort is all you can ask. Everyone's work is equally important. A sense of timing is the mark of genius. All things are delicately interconnected. Abuse of power comes as no surprise.
Julie Tremblay
But isn't there a limited number of original ideas in the world? I think that there is, it is up to one to take one of those ideas and make the best out it. What else is there to do?
Susan Prince Thompson
the problem is, when you see a really great show, one of the personal artist-criteria of it being really great is that it makes you want to get right back into the studio!- as it reminds you of why you got into all this in the first place! and you are inspired and really grateful "stealing" as a strategic move isn't part of this initial response although the cadmium red thing can be perceived as such also--art is a dialogue--nobody alone is an innovator IMHO
Amie Oliver
Best or First? Best can be subjective and First is often determined by who gets the press....or ink...or a critic's notice.... First. Tiresome? yes.
Samuel T. Adams
Ralph Waldo Emerson: "All my best thoughts were stolen by the ancients."
Esteban Schimpf
This is a sensitive topic because when people make something they think it's theirs and theirs FOREVER but when you make something and put it in the world it then becomes the world's.
I think people are still really married to originality despite all the work that our brothers and sisters in the arts have put to dispelling this myth. People still... Read More BELIEVE they just have some doubt and some serious counter examples.
When I was in school I mixed my own ykblue and started painting everything blue just like Yves because he didn't get a chance to paint enough things blue (heart attack at 33 or something from using too much meth) and then all the cool kids a year later started doing the same. Oh well! my bad idea got passed on and just got a little worse...
Eric Beltz
I think the only problem with stealing is if you get stolen from and the person who stole from you did it better than you. But that's YOUR problem not theirs. Obviously you are a creative original force but not the perfect-er of what you created. That is the natural course of innovation and evolution (so says Aldous Huxley). Stevie Ray Vaughn plays... Read More Jimi Hendrix better than Hendrix could (not really stealing though) and Natalie Imbruglia perfected the song Torn - which she ripped off from a small, unheard-of band named Ednaswap. Ednaswap then tried and tried to re-record that dumb song and make it better than NI could. But to no avail. They just showed themselves to be a 2nd rate pop band. Stealing in a creative sense gets dealt with, I believe, democratically. You win some you lose some. But if what comes after you is better, then you just gotta suck it.
Abby Manock
It's like the elevator scene at the end of Working Girl. EXACTLY like that.
Carol Diehl
I think it's okay to steal UP, not DOWN. In other words I've borrowed bits from Alfred Jensen, Johns, Richter and myriad others, but it was NOT okay when a well-known artist came to our school as a visiting artist and blatantly co-opted a graduate student's idea. As he left her studio her studio-mate said, "You're going to see that in Chelsea next year" and she was right. I was angry but said to my student (who took it better than I did), "Don't worry, you'll have more ideas and he won't."
Jeff Gabel
Here's a quote from a one thomas stolperer, in its original context it was just 1 example to support a wider issue, but make my point here, I think: "Have you noticed artists refusing to talk about their new secret ideas until after they've been shown publicly? Anyone making real art shouldn’t be worried about someone copying their artwork, because you can’t copy real art, you can only copy the ideas."
Ardalan Keramati
i think (i'm qualifying just to pretend i am unsure) there are an infinite number of original ideas in the world. it's how to fit them into "art" which can be more limited if your work is medium specific, or an "art context", which is limitless.
Esteban Schimpf
I LOVE stories of artists (who no one knows about) talking about famous he or she came into their studio and took their ideas all the way to the bank!
true or not they're great. Good post Carol!
Martin Bland
If no one 'stole' we would still be roaming the plains of a Savannah, by this I mean that innovation necessitates some sort of imitation or else we would all have to start at point A. I think this may be applied to art, no? There is also the hundreth' monkey effect in anthropology, why wouldnt this be the case in art as well? http://en.wikipedia.... Read Morehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hundredth-monkey_effect
I think the who did it first approach is short sighted as well unless you clarify that with who did it first with the where-with-all to get the attention of the culture industry. As Duchamp said repeatedly, 'these things may have existed before but we did not recognize them'. For instance there is certainly 3 dimensional figurative art during the reign of the Pharaohs, but it is not noticed because it was not sanctioned.
Bill Brady
I like this quote by Jeff Gabel Anyone making real art shouldn’t be worried about someone copying their artwork, because you can’t copy real art, you can only copy the ideas."
Kathy Schnapper
Something that I learned from Leo Steinberg: 'Whatever else it might be about, all great art [or literature] is about art." This 'problem' of stealing is something that art students worry about all the time, when they should be focusing on what is happening, or not, with their own work. Just as their was plenty of room for both the Cubism of ... Read MorePicasso and of Braque, so it is with every other style or material. The only exception that I would make to that is something that is an outright forgery.
Esteban Schimpf
wait wait this is all going too much in favor of the copy.
WHAT ABOUT FIRST TO MARKET
COKE is still better/bigger than PEPSI no matter what!
Julie Tremblay
Not sure about infinite number of ideas. It's like saying that there is an infinite number of things to talk about. There isn't. There are actually only few things that can be talked about. And only few boundaries broken. Kathy, I think you are right on!
Bill Brady
I have heard this from friends accusing me and others that they had the idea first! great.... I have also seen professors borrow everything good from his students studio's and doing it better and have exhibitions with the work!
whoever i...s genius enough to put it out there is the clear winner
If artists are upset or complain then they really are ... Read Moreblind to what is out there and what gets put out there maybe just to much studio time and not enough hustle Artist make themselves, along with their friends and those worried or concerned about stealing ideas need to look around. Ones interpretation is crucial. :-0
Carol Diehl
Despite my earlier comment, I find most artists who complain that their ideas were stolen kind of pathetic, and that the person who they say "stole" it did a better job with it. In the case of my graduate student, though, her work WAS better.
Esteban Schimpf
we like Kraftwerk because they did it first (at least to a largish audience) . There are MANY electronic bands today that make better but we're less interested in them because KRAFTWERK did it fist.
INNOVATORS AND ORIGINATORS
Victoria Wolfe
I find it irritating to spy Artist A's ideas in the work of Artist B. Just seems lazy.
Keren Moscovitch
I think it depends on whether the value is placed on the concept or the execution. Someone who steals a concept and executes it may not be much more than a commercial designer, as far as "fine art" is concerned. If it's a one-liner, then the concept can only be cashed in on a limited number of times. The richer the experience that is created by the work, the more nuanced the work (in the original OR copy), the less "copying" is a relevant matter.
Esteban Schimpf
what are some good historical examples of this "copy"?
I don't know what we're talking about Jer
Jah Jah
There is appropriation here and then there is down right plagiarism. Many of my contemporaries are very close to be called Original , though there is a thick lining of blatant thievery. The biggest problem with the notion of executing an idea with a bit more pizzaz according to ones budget. Alix Lambert did tattooed pig skins on a modest budget ... Read More10 years before the William Delvoye did his tattooed pigskin at Perrotin-Also my crystal skulls on black laminate http://thing.net/~janine/THING.NET/MEDIA_AND_DRAWINGS.html#5 that was exhibited at the Stedelijk years b4 Damien Hirst- ... who got paid more? but mostly who had more money behind them- THat is 2 examples of FEMALE artists being highly ripped off of by well funded- artists-
Noah G. Hoffman
Rothko ripped off the Hopi beginning in 1941. It impacted every image he painted from that point forward. Why does the NGA refuse to recognize this and use public funds to publish Rothko books that won't acknowledge indigenous influences even though the evidence is astounding.
http://rothkono.wordpress/
No emails answered from Chris Rothko in four years!
Julie Tremblay
But still, innovators and originators may still be working with ideas that had been floating around for a while. Did no one do electronic music before Kraftwerk??? It DID come from somewhere!
Jan Rothschild
Didn't this discussion start like 5000 years ago? (Ecclesiastes 1:9-14 NIV) What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.
Sherry Bittle Rader
You nailed it Jerry. If someone "steals" an idea or technique, they will do it their way whether they realize it or not. Your work remains yours, and if it's good, or dare I say great, it will shine regardless. No fear people! Work, work, work! Grow, grow, grow!
Jah Jah
another example of a certain male photographer who is often out and out stealing from me and getting paid 10 times more- in actuality - Most critics and real collectors appreciate my work much more than this young man, but his club got him more fame than I , to the extent that I was even asked if it was I , who was stealing from this unnamed contemporary who photographs grainy misty nekkid men now....and monochromes too--
Esteban Schimpf
YOU GO NOAH!
let's all get pissed like we did at MOMA and make the ghost of Rothko accountable.
I am reading Howard Zinn's History of the USA so this kind of stuff really sets me off.... Read More
I'M NOT DOWN WITH COLONIALISM (anymore!/ever again!)
Esteban Schimpf
Julie T to answer your Q, YES!
Musique concrète
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musique_concr%C3%A8te
Jen Bradford
The Rothko assailants just gave me a good laugh. Thanks guys.
Stefany Roseman Benson
What's the difference between being influenced, appropriating, copying or lifting wholesale? As far as I'm concerned, nothing. The one non-subjective assessment of the value of a work of art is how many other artists have done any or all those things in response to it.
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
I like Bill's comment about timing. That is in part what I am referring to. So, this obsession started for me when I discovered that an artist who had been working with imagery from "The Hills" (as I have) got written up in the New York Times (http://themoment.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/05/the-hills-lauren-conrads-pastel-pathos/). I was so ... Read Morefrustrated, because the artist, Karin Bubas, had simply finished the body of work faster than me and gotten it out into the world faster. And let's face it, when you make art about popular TV culture, you have to get it out there fast. My reaction was juvenile, I realize. But has this ever happened to any of you? So yes, I am talking about subject matter and concept, not technique. This might be awful to say, but I feel that technique is free for the taking. It's the idea "stealing" that bothers me (although of course "stealing" is the wrong word in this case...I don't even know Karin Bubas! How could she "steal" from me if she'd never seen my work?)
Susan Prince Thompson
my gnarly old father, still working, age 86, product of modernism, who taught sculpture for most of his life, always told his students to stop worrying about being "original"--"' 'Original' is like climbing Mt Everest and spitting, okay??" --heard that old chestnut throughout my childhood
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
But it does bring up this perhaps juvenile question...what if you were working on a great idea, and so is someone else, and they get the body of work out there first? I realize I sound like a disgruntled kid on the playground...
Zeynep Solakoglu
There has to be a diffrence between inspiration and copying everybody has their own way of doing things..you musnt loose your touch with your work.
Melody Owen
conversely, i find it interesting the way artists today try to stake a claim on symbols and materials; boats, dresses, antlers, string, etc... it seems that in the face of the obliteration of individual artistic identity due to over-saturation and over-population, people are grasping at universal symbols in an attempt to declare their "unique" artistic voice.
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
Someone said to me once, after I'd studied art in Bali for a year, that in Asia everyone steals from everyone, and it's considered a compliment to be stolen from there, but in the US, everyone also steals from everyone, but they all pretend that they don't. I found that amusing, although it is a gross generalization, obviously.
Cassandra Jennings Hall
yeah everything has been done before or so I've been told, artist recreate with a different slant or flavor based on their own creativity...
Susan Prince Thompson
on the other hand, apropos of Carol Diehl's remarks, in grad school I had a couple big (for me) ideas copied/appropriated/stolen by professors and it didn't feel so hot so I guess "it's complicated" with teachers etc
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
Ooh, Jah Jah, that is rough...yikes,
Really, Susan? Eek...so, personally, I think this IS a real issue...
Melody Owen
it is complicated... as ideas are so wrapped up with identity for artists, especially conceptual artists.
Susan Silton
This is a multileveled discussion, Jerry. First of all there's the topic of originality, which I couldn't begin to define. And then authorship has always been a tricky business. I think this topic is less relevant with regard to ideas (because all of us live in the world and are influenced by what we absorb, historical or otherwise, which means our... Read More work inevitably reflects to whatever extent what we absorb) and more relevant in terms of the "market." In this arena, the problem here, of course, is that the market continues to privilege a handful of artists. Most artists do not have the privilege of visibility (and way too often the concomitant privilege of unconditional support) that this handful of artists consistently enjoys. A less known artist in the market who is making work with similar content or aesthetic choices as a highly visible artist will immediately be accused, and glossed over because of, being derivative of that artist's work, as opposed to the other way around.
Julie Ryan
Imitation is the greatest form of flattery. And there is the homage! I saw a show of a young polish artist and the gallerist explained it was an "homage" to Franz West and Heimo Zobernig. (The gallery happems to show them all). But by saying that gallerist hoped to add credence to the work. Not stealing. Not appropriation. Homage!
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
So here's something else. I am starting a new project which is only text. I think the concept/idea is great, but the whole thing is SO easy to copy. Do I keep all new work off my website, and not show it to ANYONE, until I get into a big show? (now, don't copy me, you guys)
Sean Capone
Julie, I'd have to argue against there being "a limited number of ideas in the world". Ideas aren't like natural resources that we pluck from the ether. It's a process of inference, intuition, education, instinct...and there are so many degrees of stealing, appropriation, contextual reframing etc..If that's the way that Kirsten stated the issue, it... Read More sounds like she's got an axe to grind already?
Please let's retire that "great artists steal" chestnut...like with Duchamp, Warhol et al. it's a dry witticism, not a call to arms..it worked for them (only). Isn't it funny, though, that it would be *impossible* to steal from these artists who were the biggest thieves of them all?
Jah Jah
yea Kristen- actually my real name is Janine Gordon- check out how Steven Meisel ripped off work that is critically acclaimed and got paid 6 figures--
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=139089&id=668755049
Susan Silton
And unfortunately, I think what this means is a kind of tacit negation of people's creative process along class lines...artists need to be and should be fierce about protecting that process in themselves. I'll leave the discussion about overt plagiarism out of this...that to me has nothing to do with creative process but more to do with a desperate desire to be one of the chosen...
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
True, Susan...but it's still hard to feel like after someone comes out with "my" idea "first" that *I* then will look like the copier.
Jah Jah
so this is what is happening on a daily with me
http://www.radiotania.org/images/ryan_mcginley1-1.jpg
http://thing.net/~janine/THING.NET/STUNTS.html#0
Jah Jah
http://www.tinyvices.com/ryan_mcginley_IKWTSG_9.jpg
http://thing.net/~janine/THING.NET/STUNTS.html#5
Jerry Saltz
Sam (42 minutes ago); Jan (25 minutes ago): WORD.
Jah Jah
http://www.seenataritzia.com/image/artists/ryanMcginley.jpg
http://thing.net/~janine/THING.NET/MOSH_PIT.html#5
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
Janine, I can't view that FB album...I guess I have to be your friend to see it?
Jah Jah
http://www.nyc.com/image/users/blogs/5428.jpg
http://thing.net/~janine/THING.NET/MOSH_PIT.html#21
Jerry Saltz
Maybe this comes back to the fact that artists can be such big babies? And, I think one steals up, down, around, whatever. I mean didn't Guston say he took from "crapola?" Wasn't the "high low" discourse one of the most prominant of the 20th century?
Rachel Hines
Here's a good quote from Felix Gonzales-Torres:
think more than anything else I'm just an extension of certain practices, minimalism or conceptualism, that I am developing areas I think were not totally dealt with. I don't like this idea of having to undermine your ancestors, of ridiculing them, undermining them, and making less out of them. I think we're part of a historical process and I think that this attitude that you have to murder your father in order to start something new is bullshit. We are part of this culture, we don't come from outer space, so whatever I do is already something that has entered my brain from some other sources and is then synthesized into something new. I respect my elders and I learn from them. There's nothing wrong
with accepting that. I'm secure enough to accept those influences. I don't have anxiety about originality, I really don't.
Interview with Felix Gonzalez-Torres by Robert Storr
ArtPress
January 1995
Pages: 24 -32
By: Robert Storr
Jah Jah
DO YOU SEE WHAT RIAN MCGINNLY DOES TO MY WORK JERRY ???? IS THIS OK???? HE STUDIES THE HECK OUT OF ME AND U KNOW THAT IVE BEEN AROUND LONGER AND HOTTER.. SSO PLEASE TELL ME WHAT I AM DOING WRONG AND HE IS DOING SO RIGHT THAT HE CAN GET AWAY WITH USING EVERY THING I DO AS INSPIRATION _
Jerry Saltz
I go with Richard Prince on this one: "I'm not interested in 'making it new;' I'm interested in making it again."
I say steal from anywhere at any time.
Leah Anderst
Could the idea of drawing from the same wellspring of the spirit of the age apply here too? Certain styles and themes dominate individual periods and places, and without ever seeing each other's work, two artists could easily produce very similar pieces.
The question of plagiarism is clearly totally different than this, but just a thought.
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
I know, I know, I agree about the big babies thing, see the playground comment above. And there is a possibility that my ideas are pretty obvious, and that of course others are doing them, because they are not that original. I think I need to be OK with that.
Jah Jah
so its ok because he has some more prominent friends- and he can get paid more than me-- ok- then let everyone steal and I WILL BE ARMED AND DANGEROUS_ haha
Jerry Saltz
I am a big fan of the work of Benjamin Edwards. He was a student of mine at RISD, as was Julie Mehretu. Love 'em both as people. But there's no doubt at all that Mehretu got A LOT from Edwards; so much that in some ways she's doing his act. On the other hand, their work looks nothing like one another's and one is wolrd famous and one isn't. I still find M's work essentially decorative and think a good E. is REALLY GOOD. Oh well.
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
I love that Felix Gonzalez-Torres quote, it helps a lot. This from a guy who put a bunch of candy in a corner. And that was a great piece. But he did it first, that's the thing. (whine, whine) Maybe I need to think better, harder, longer and more thoroughly about my ideas. Maybe I just need to be BETTER and DEEPER conceptually. Gonzalez-Torres was prolific...that helps.
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
Leah, it's true. And when I remove my ego from this, I realize that that really is the most important point.
Kurt Kauper
I remember Lari Pittman dismissing criticism of artists who supposedly "stole" from him, saying "it's all public property." I think he got it right.
Brad Farwell
I've been studying photography within museums (ie tourists taking pictures) for a year or so now, traveled to italy, did some interviews with curators there and here at the Met, and then had the NYT do a front-web-page story about the concept before I had gotten anything out my door, product-wise.
Did I spend a day or three being pissy about that... Read More? Yes. But it reminded me that whole idea of the journey being more important than the goal is true; making this work has been extremely interesting and rewarding for me, whether or not I got it out the gate to the public first.
You can steal a product, but you can't steal the experience gained by making the product.
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
Perhaps Julie Mehretu is more popular because she IS decorative and that sells. And maybe she is better at marketing herself than the other one. I'm sad to say I have not heard of Benjamin Edwards.
Lori-Ann Bellissimo
I have encountered many other artists "copying" what I do...using my technique or at least trying to, using my imagery, using my size formats etc...I think there's room for everybody. The thing is I did it first. And my new ideas are always perculating...those "copycats" can try to keep up with me...I'm not interested. It's my personal legend to do... Read More what I do and everyone has their own path. From my early days of reading the likes of my fave crits like Thomas Albright it seems who does it best is at hand...Well I do it first and I do it best. I don't reason why it's just the way. The matter at hand is that it may not be immediately obvious to everyone at the time but why does it have to be. We re visit work all the time and I know my work stands the test of time...it's something that was ingrained into my approach and those "copycats" they play on novelty and fads. I'm busy building a body of work, a career that speaks of my life path and I know how to draw. I know I am truthful.
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
"You can steal a product, but you can't steal the experience gained by making the product." Thumbs up.
M.F. Tichy
Originality is a Modernist myth that is still partially clung to.
Jerry Saltz
Empress Jah-Jah: I don't see much resemblance between your work and RM's. He pictures a very close tribe of people; you picture a much larger tribe. His work is very much about him; yours is about WHO you are photographing and what they are doing; who they are or are not changing the world or creating culture; his work is more about white youth; ... yours is not limited in that way. His vision is very clear; yours is wider and therefore doesn't feel as personal. I am not saying it ISN'T personal, my Queen. You are multi-focused. He is singular focus.
Jerry Saltz
Rachel: Word.
Jerry Saltz
Kurt: Word.
Jerry Saltz
M.F. Word.
Sam Tan
Nothing is created in a vacuum, ever.
Sean Capone
When I say "thieves' of course I mean that in the best possible sense... :)
When we learn to read & speak, someone else came up with those words. I don't really believe that all art is stealing just because we learned how to draw or shoot film in formal ways.
Doug Henders
good artists borrow.. great artists steal - Pablo Picasso
Jah Jah
Jerry if he starts shooting Cowboys and my secret next project Im going to go after his head-- sorry but many important people like yourself have pointed out that he is trailing my work- the dust- then the smoke then the monochromes- I have a long history of photographing tribal youths- he is blatantly borrowing visual elements of my work that he is inspired - although in my work it is usually the actual situation as opposed to a totally staged composition. xo
Stephan Fowlkes
there is derivitive art and then there is art which capitalizes on what came before...
William Walker
Bad artists copy, great artists steal.
Not my quote.
Jeff Zimmermann
Simultaneaty (sp), osmosis, and influence are fair and honest. Stealing which we've all seen is cheap and really bs. It makes you not an artist but ripoff artist. C'mon...
Fiona Ross
I love to make things that surprise me. If "stealing" surprises me, well then!
Scott Groeniger
For me it's ultimately about who decides what work gets shown and why. So the idea that generated this topic "originally" for Kirsten and I was when we saw an artist's work that was very similar to an idea we had already explored "in theory" over a year ago come to prominence in a gallery setting very publicly. And when we saw this particular ... manifestation of the exact same ideas, the paintings frankly were SO literal... so OBVIOUS and so direct, that I was completely underwhelmed that a gallery curator would actually go for that work painted in that way. The paintings we saw would NEVER fly in art school. The execution was, at best, undergraduate level. Not that I really care that much about the technique of painting, however this was just astonishingly bad (and not in a good way).
So we began this process of deconstructing the notion of originality and the visual manifestation of similar, if not identical ideas. That led us to positing this issue to Jerry's FB site.
Jerry Saltz
Jah-Jah: I worship your musical self but i think you just made a v. strong case for how your work is totally different from yours. It would be fine with me if he photographed Cowboys next too (I presume Richard Prince would have no problem with that). Regal princess, no one owens anything. Regardless, his work has made a v. different point than yours. In the end it is about YOU not HIM. I beg your leave ...
Jerry Saltz
(I meant that J-J's work is "totally different from RM's")
about an hour ago
Jah Jah
Jah Jah
ok whatever- ill just work for Ryan Mcguinnly and hope i can get my rent paid from all his sales haha
Jerry Saltz
Jah-Jah: With your permission, I htink that in your inner-head you must leave the RM train of thought alone. It is irrelevant to what you do, how it is received, and what you will make. I am walking away slowly without turning my back to you, Oh Great Jah-Jah.
Jerry Saltz
Scott: What are you talking about? Who? What paintings? Since it was all public we need to know. Or it doesn't mean anything.
about an hour ago
Jah Jah
Jah Jah
thank u for your thoughts jerry you opened my eyes to another perspective:) bless
Sean Capone
Re: Felix Gonzales Torres quote--nice. That really said it perfectly. But I still think his ideas are better than his art.
Jerry: interesting connection between Edwards & Mehretu. I really like both, and see the connections without having known about their relationship. I could see them side-by-side in a themed show, however, without thinking they were biting each other's style. Maybe we should go back to the age of stylistic schools (AbEx, Impressionism etc) and duke it out that way!
Michele Gallagher
Hi Jerry -
RE Rae Simonsen wants to talk about "artists stealing ideas from other artists."
Dude Thats all the bitches seem to know how to do
Steal my Fing ideas
but because they are all hooked up with rich book and magazine publishers (bitches) they come out like Hey look at my book about crochet! They didn't give a Shiz about it till I was blogging it non stop Hence the stealing LOL But no worries I come up with original ideas every day they can't catch me... Read More
If too fast and dyslexic that works too
Love you Jerry
xoxo
crafty cameleon
aka lucky bastards club
P. Elaine Sharpe
As an artist I wondered often about my own responsibility in knowing the influences that passed from others into me. I remember my first moment of 'that bitch stole my idea'. I also recall the first time I saw someone else's work resolve an idea I had been roiling over, and did it so well that I gave up on the idea. No problem. I snoozed, I losed. ... Read MoreThe one thing that I find discomfiting, no matter how much I can rationalize it away, is when I make a work and then find out that someone senior to me has made similar work, and I have to stress the fact that it is the similarity in idea or concept that is most jarring, not the visual trope. Works can and do look similar, that's to be expected, but to work away on an idea that is borne of my own experience and thinking and to come upon it as executed by someone I should have known about, whether unexpectedly or have someone else point it out to me, is really a blow. If I steal or quote or pay homage, I prefer it to be a conscious act.
Ravenna Taylor
I am a nobody in the art world, but I've had artistic ideas "stolen" by people who are less and who are more accomplished, a couple times - an artist who took a studio space near mine, and another couple who were invited in for studio visits. Just seems like a good impetus to move on to me. I think artists who won't tell their secret medium's ... Read Moreformula, or whatever, are silly. Since I'm trying to make things I like to look at, if someone wants to help fill the world with my ideas, go for it. I'm no good at making myself famous. But I will just keep generating my ideas, which I will conjure out of my experiences, including my experiences of other art.
Susan Quaglia Brown
Where inspiration comes from is a mystery to me! I once unintentionally stole from an art critic! An artist friend was visiting my studio, commenting on my work, and I said "That painting is Jackson Pollock meets Andy Warhol." She looked at me astonished because she had just read those very words/analogy that morning in an art review about an ... Read Moreartist's work.
This kind of thing happens to me all the time, I pluck information out of the ether. Marie Louise von Franz (Jung's better half) wrote that we would be shocked to realize how un-original we actually are and how rare it is to have an original thought.
John Haber
It's important to recognize too that stealing has had different values in different times. Renaissance it's called doing your job or it's training. Pointillism it's ideology. Duchamp it's f** art. Walter Benjamin or Roz Krauss it's the death of the avant garde. Warhol it's that unique mix of love, loss, and detachment. Other Pop Artists its ... Read Morecelebration. Sherrie Levine's generation it's who owns art history. Now it's often self-aggrandizement. But it's never simply akin to copyright violation and is an essential part of the game.
Jerry Saltz
Hey: Get over to the REPOST. Everytime you post here now you'll delete someone above. I know you're all antsy to go for it but come on, be nice ....
Sean Capone
re: JahJah: "although in my work it is usually the actual situation as opposed to a totally staged composition". Isn't this the keystone of how your work is different than La McGinnley's? You are arguing about stylisms and effects.
Andra Samelson
didn't picasso say, "i never borrow, I steal"!
Jerry Saltz
I will pull this car over right now if you don't get over to the other post!!!!
Doug Henders
stealing is a form of homage. If someone is stealing your ideas and becoming successful then its a form of validation. Given the speed of information it will come your way shortly and the light will shine on you. Be ready.
Jerry Salz said:
Kirsten Rae Simonsen wants to talk about "artists stealing ideas from other artists." Okay, lets see if there's anything here. Obvioulsy, ALL ART comes from other art. So all art steals from other art. Kirsten must mean something diffe...rent. As a critic I'm very interested in who did what first; but really, I am more interested in who did what "best." Artists, you tell me.
Mark Shunney said
I found it interesting why James Turrell moved from LA to the desert. In his words- It was to get away from the gallery represented Robert Irwin.
Jerry Saltz
Of course, I have watched in art scholls where one students, say, starts using Cadmium Red Light and all of a sudden, like a virus, all of these other artists are using Cadmium Red Light. I never thoguht of this as "stealing." I always thought that it just meant that for whatever reasons Cadmium Red Light just made sense to people, and (you know me), that CRL ITSELF had a need to be seen. ??
And I read my own reviews and see dozens of ideas from dozens of places. So, I'm stealing, I suppose, all the time too.
AdrienneRose Gionta
recently this has been a hot topic around here as one artist directly copied exact imagery from another and tried to pass it off as her own. you can check out this blog for more details if you have the time or concern... i would luv to hear what you think!
Clayton Sean Horton
don't the best artists disguise their sources the best?
Jen Bradford
I agree with your criteria. Artists cannibalize everything, it goes with the territory. So I'd be curious to know what Kirsten had in mind. Not subject matter, surely - stealing what?
Brynna Kate Tucker
I think there is a difference between stealing and innovation. I'm not sure I'm as interested in NEW as I am in IMPROVED. Improved is a direct celebration of the original, but with a new approach or result. It recognizes the past, though and gives it a nod. Innovative ways of thinking, making, and seeing are what interest me in contemporary art... and design as well.
Clayton Sean Horton
yes, if i see anymore canned foam or beeswax in a mfa studio, i'm going to headbutt someone.
Zachary Ziemann
its all about stealing you just have to obscure your source
AdrienneRose Gionta
http://culturallysubvertingbedtimestories.blogspot.com/
here is some of the details about the battle between artists going on over here right now
Julie Tremblay
Didn't Picasso say: Bad artist borrow, good artists steal!"?
Bill Gusky
A sincere effort is all you can ask. Everyone's work is equally important. A sense of timing is the mark of genius. All things are delicately interconnected. Abuse of power comes as no surprise.
Julie Tremblay
But isn't there a limited number of original ideas in the world? I think that there is, it is up to one to take one of those ideas and make the best out it. What else is there to do?
Susan Prince Thompson
the problem is, when you see a really great show, one of the personal artist-criteria of it being really great is that it makes you want to get right back into the studio!- as it reminds you of why you got into all this in the first place! and you are inspired and really grateful "stealing" as a strategic move isn't part of this initial response although the cadmium red thing can be perceived as such also--art is a dialogue--nobody alone is an innovator IMHO
Amie Oliver
Best or First? Best can be subjective and First is often determined by who gets the press....or ink...or a critic's notice.... First. Tiresome? yes.
Samuel T. Adams
Ralph Waldo Emerson: "All my best thoughts were stolen by the ancients."
Esteban Schimpf
This is a sensitive topic because when people make something they think it's theirs and theirs FOREVER but when you make something and put it in the world it then becomes the world's.
I think people are still really married to originality despite all the work that our brothers and sisters in the arts have put to dispelling this myth. People still... Read More BELIEVE they just have some doubt and some serious counter examples.
When I was in school I mixed my own ykblue and started painting everything blue just like Yves because he didn't get a chance to paint enough things blue (heart attack at 33 or something from using too much meth) and then all the cool kids a year later started doing the same. Oh well! my bad idea got passed on and just got a little worse...
Eric Beltz
I think the only problem with stealing is if you get stolen from and the person who stole from you did it better than you. But that's YOUR problem not theirs. Obviously you are a creative original force but not the perfect-er of what you created. That is the natural course of innovation and evolution (so says Aldous Huxley). Stevie Ray Vaughn plays... Read More Jimi Hendrix better than Hendrix could (not really stealing though) and Natalie Imbruglia perfected the song Torn - which she ripped off from a small, unheard-of band named Ednaswap. Ednaswap then tried and tried to re-record that dumb song and make it better than NI could. But to no avail. They just showed themselves to be a 2nd rate pop band. Stealing in a creative sense gets dealt with, I believe, democratically. You win some you lose some. But if what comes after you is better, then you just gotta suck it.
Abby Manock
It's like the elevator scene at the end of Working Girl. EXACTLY like that.
Carol Diehl
I think it's okay to steal UP, not DOWN. In other words I've borrowed bits from Alfred Jensen, Johns, Richter and myriad others, but it was NOT okay when a well-known artist came to our school as a visiting artist and blatantly co-opted a graduate student's idea. As he left her studio her studio-mate said, "You're going to see that in Chelsea next year" and she was right. I was angry but said to my student (who took it better than I did), "Don't worry, you'll have more ideas and he won't."
Jeff Gabel
Here's a quote from a one thomas stolperer, in its original context it was just 1 example to support a wider issue, but make my point here, I think: "Have you noticed artists refusing to talk about their new secret ideas until after they've been shown publicly? Anyone making real art shouldn’t be worried about someone copying their artwork, because you can’t copy real art, you can only copy the ideas."
Ardalan Keramati
i think (i'm qualifying just to pretend i am unsure) there are an infinite number of original ideas in the world. it's how to fit them into "art" which can be more limited if your work is medium specific, or an "art context", which is limitless.
Esteban Schimpf
I LOVE stories of artists (who no one knows about) talking about famous he or she came into their studio and took their ideas all the way to the bank!
true or not they're great. Good post Carol!
Martin Bland
If no one 'stole' we would still be roaming the plains of a Savannah, by this I mean that innovation necessitates some sort of imitation or else we would all have to start at point A. I think this may be applied to art, no? There is also the hundreth' monkey effect in anthropology, why wouldnt this be the case in art as well? http://en.wikipedia.... Read Morehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hundredth-monkey_effect
I think the who did it first approach is short sighted as well unless you clarify that with who did it first with the where-with-all to get the attention of the culture industry. As Duchamp said repeatedly, 'these things may have existed before but we did not recognize them'. For instance there is certainly 3 dimensional figurative art during the reign of the Pharaohs, but it is not noticed because it was not sanctioned.
Bill Brady
I like this quote by Jeff Gabel Anyone making real art shouldn’t be worried about someone copying their artwork, because you can’t copy real art, you can only copy the ideas."
Kathy Schnapper
Something that I learned from Leo Steinberg: 'Whatever else it might be about, all great art [or literature] is about art." This 'problem' of stealing is something that art students worry about all the time, when they should be focusing on what is happening, or not, with their own work. Just as their was plenty of room for both the Cubism of ... Read MorePicasso and of Braque, so it is with every other style or material. The only exception that I would make to that is something that is an outright forgery.
Esteban Schimpf
wait wait this is all going too much in favor of the copy.
WHAT ABOUT FIRST TO MARKET
COKE is still better/bigger than PEPSI no matter what!
Julie Tremblay
Not sure about infinite number of ideas. It's like saying that there is an infinite number of things to talk about. There isn't. There are actually only few things that can be talked about. And only few boundaries broken. Kathy, I think you are right on!
Bill Brady
I have heard this from friends accusing me and others that they had the idea first! great.... I have also seen professors borrow everything good from his students studio's and doing it better and have exhibitions with the work!
whoever i...s genius enough to put it out there is the clear winner
If artists are upset or complain then they really are ... Read Moreblind to what is out there and what gets put out there maybe just to much studio time and not enough hustle Artist make themselves, along with their friends and those worried or concerned about stealing ideas need to look around. Ones interpretation is crucial. :-0
Carol Diehl
Despite my earlier comment, I find most artists who complain that their ideas were stolen kind of pathetic, and that the person who they say "stole" it did a better job with it. In the case of my graduate student, though, her work WAS better.
Esteban Schimpf
we like Kraftwerk because they did it first (at least to a largish audience) . There are MANY electronic bands today that make better but we're less interested in them because KRAFTWERK did it fist.
INNOVATORS AND ORIGINATORS
Victoria Wolfe
I find it irritating to spy Artist A's ideas in the work of Artist B. Just seems lazy.
Keren Moscovitch
I think it depends on whether the value is placed on the concept or the execution. Someone who steals a concept and executes it may not be much more than a commercial designer, as far as "fine art" is concerned. If it's a one-liner, then the concept can only be cashed in on a limited number of times. The richer the experience that is created by the work, the more nuanced the work (in the original OR copy), the less "copying" is a relevant matter.
Esteban Schimpf
what are some good historical examples of this "copy"?
I don't know what we're talking about Jer
Jah Jah
There is appropriation here and then there is down right plagiarism. Many of my contemporaries are very close to be called Original , though there is a thick lining of blatant thievery. The biggest problem with the notion of executing an idea with a bit more pizzaz according to ones budget. Alix Lambert did tattooed pig skins on a modest budget ... Read More10 years before the William Delvoye did his tattooed pigskin at Perrotin-Also my crystal skulls on black laminate http://thing.net/~janine/THING.NET/MEDIA_AND_DRAWINGS.html#5 that was exhibited at the Stedelijk years b4 Damien Hirst- ... who got paid more? but mostly who had more money behind them- THat is 2 examples of FEMALE artists being highly ripped off of by well funded- artists-
Noah G. Hoffman
Rothko ripped off the Hopi beginning in 1941. It impacted every image he painted from that point forward. Why does the NGA refuse to recognize this and use public funds to publish Rothko books that won't acknowledge indigenous influences even though the evidence is astounding.
http://rothkono.wordpress/
No emails answered from Chris Rothko in four years!
Julie Tremblay
But still, innovators and originators may still be working with ideas that had been floating around for a while. Did no one do electronic music before Kraftwerk??? It DID come from somewhere!
Jan Rothschild
Didn't this discussion start like 5000 years ago? (Ecclesiastes 1:9-14 NIV) What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.
Sherry Bittle Rader
You nailed it Jerry. If someone "steals" an idea or technique, they will do it their way whether they realize it or not. Your work remains yours, and if it's good, or dare I say great, it will shine regardless. No fear people! Work, work, work! Grow, grow, grow!
Jah Jah
another example of a certain male photographer who is often out and out stealing from me and getting paid 10 times more- in actuality - Most critics and real collectors appreciate my work much more than this young man, but his club got him more fame than I , to the extent that I was even asked if it was I , who was stealing from this unnamed contemporary who photographs grainy misty nekkid men now....and monochromes too--
Esteban Schimpf
YOU GO NOAH!
let's all get pissed like we did at MOMA and make the ghost of Rothko accountable.
I am reading Howard Zinn's History of the USA so this kind of stuff really sets me off.... Read More
I'M NOT DOWN WITH COLONIALISM (anymore!/ever again!)
Esteban Schimpf
Julie T to answer your Q, YES!
Musique concrète
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musique_concr%C3%A8te
Jen Bradford
The Rothko assailants just gave me a good laugh. Thanks guys.
Stefany Roseman Benson
What's the difference between being influenced, appropriating, copying or lifting wholesale? As far as I'm concerned, nothing. The one non-subjective assessment of the value of a work of art is how many other artists have done any or all those things in response to it.
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
I like Bill's comment about timing. That is in part what I am referring to. So, this obsession started for me when I discovered that an artist who had been working with imagery from "The Hills" (as I have) got written up in the New York Times (http://themoment.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/05/the-hills-lauren-conrads-pastel-pathos/). I was so ... Read Morefrustrated, because the artist, Karin Bubas, had simply finished the body of work faster than me and gotten it out into the world faster. And let's face it, when you make art about popular TV culture, you have to get it out there fast. My reaction was juvenile, I realize. But has this ever happened to any of you? So yes, I am talking about subject matter and concept, not technique. This might be awful to say, but I feel that technique is free for the taking. It's the idea "stealing" that bothers me (although of course "stealing" is the wrong word in this case...I don't even know Karin Bubas! How could she "steal" from me if she'd never seen my work?)
Susan Prince Thompson
my gnarly old father, still working, age 86, product of modernism, who taught sculpture for most of his life, always told his students to stop worrying about being "original"--"' 'Original' is like climbing Mt Everest and spitting, okay??" --heard that old chestnut throughout my childhood
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
But it does bring up this perhaps juvenile question...what if you were working on a great idea, and so is someone else, and they get the body of work out there first? I realize I sound like a disgruntled kid on the playground...
Zeynep Solakoglu
There has to be a diffrence between inspiration and copying everybody has their own way of doing things..you musnt loose your touch with your work.
Melody Owen
conversely, i find it interesting the way artists today try to stake a claim on symbols and materials; boats, dresses, antlers, string, etc... it seems that in the face of the obliteration of individual artistic identity due to over-saturation and over-population, people are grasping at universal symbols in an attempt to declare their "unique" artistic voice.
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
Someone said to me once, after I'd studied art in Bali for a year, that in Asia everyone steals from everyone, and it's considered a compliment to be stolen from there, but in the US, everyone also steals from everyone, but they all pretend that they don't. I found that amusing, although it is a gross generalization, obviously.
Cassandra Jennings Hall
yeah everything has been done before or so I've been told, artist recreate with a different slant or flavor based on their own creativity...
Susan Prince Thompson
on the other hand, apropos of Carol Diehl's remarks, in grad school I had a couple big (for me) ideas copied/appropriated/stolen by professors and it didn't feel so hot so I guess "it's complicated" with teachers etc
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
Ooh, Jah Jah, that is rough...yikes,
Really, Susan? Eek...so, personally, I think this IS a real issue...
Melody Owen
it is complicated... as ideas are so wrapped up with identity for artists, especially conceptual artists.
Susan Silton
This is a multileveled discussion, Jerry. First of all there's the topic of originality, which I couldn't begin to define. And then authorship has always been a tricky business. I think this topic is less relevant with regard to ideas (because all of us live in the world and are influenced by what we absorb, historical or otherwise, which means our... Read More work inevitably reflects to whatever extent what we absorb) and more relevant in terms of the "market." In this arena, the problem here, of course, is that the market continues to privilege a handful of artists. Most artists do not have the privilege of visibility (and way too often the concomitant privilege of unconditional support) that this handful of artists consistently enjoys. A less known artist in the market who is making work with similar content or aesthetic choices as a highly visible artist will immediately be accused, and glossed over because of, being derivative of that artist's work, as opposed to the other way around.
Julie Ryan
Imitation is the greatest form of flattery. And there is the homage! I saw a show of a young polish artist and the gallerist explained it was an "homage" to Franz West and Heimo Zobernig. (The gallery happems to show them all). But by saying that gallerist hoped to add credence to the work. Not stealing. Not appropriation. Homage!
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
So here's something else. I am starting a new project which is only text. I think the concept/idea is great, but the whole thing is SO easy to copy. Do I keep all new work off my website, and not show it to ANYONE, until I get into a big show? (now, don't copy me, you guys)
Sean Capone
Julie, I'd have to argue against there being "a limited number of ideas in the world". Ideas aren't like natural resources that we pluck from the ether. It's a process of inference, intuition, education, instinct...and there are so many degrees of stealing, appropriation, contextual reframing etc..If that's the way that Kirsten stated the issue, it... Read More sounds like she's got an axe to grind already?
Please let's retire that "great artists steal" chestnut...like with Duchamp, Warhol et al. it's a dry witticism, not a call to arms..it worked for them (only). Isn't it funny, though, that it would be *impossible* to steal from these artists who were the biggest thieves of them all?
Jah Jah
yea Kristen- actually my real name is Janine Gordon- check out how Steven Meisel ripped off work that is critically acclaimed and got paid 6 figures--
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=139089&id=668755049
Susan Silton
And unfortunately, I think what this means is a kind of tacit negation of people's creative process along class lines...artists need to be and should be fierce about protecting that process in themselves. I'll leave the discussion about overt plagiarism out of this...that to me has nothing to do with creative process but more to do with a desperate desire to be one of the chosen...
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
True, Susan...but it's still hard to feel like after someone comes out with "my" idea "first" that *I* then will look like the copier.
Jah Jah
so this is what is happening on a daily with me
http://www.radiotania.org/images/ryan_mcginley1-1.jpg
http://thing.net/~janine/THING.NET/STUNTS.html#0
Jah Jah
http://www.tinyvices.com/ryan_mcginley_IKWTSG_9.jpg
http://thing.net/~janine/THING.NET/STUNTS.html#5
Jerry Saltz
Sam (42 minutes ago); Jan (25 minutes ago): WORD.
Jah Jah
http://www.seenataritzia.com/image/artists/ryanMcginley.jpg
http://thing.net/~janine/THING.NET/MOSH_PIT.html#5
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
Janine, I can't view that FB album...I guess I have to be your friend to see it?
Jah Jah
http://www.nyc.com/image/users/blogs/5428.jpg
http://thing.net/~janine/THING.NET/MOSH_PIT.html#21
Jerry Saltz
Maybe this comes back to the fact that artists can be such big babies? And, I think one steals up, down, around, whatever. I mean didn't Guston say he took from "crapola?" Wasn't the "high low" discourse one of the most prominant of the 20th century?
Rachel Hines
Here's a good quote from Felix Gonzales-Torres:
think more than anything else I'm just an extension of certain practices, minimalism or conceptualism, that I am developing areas I think were not totally dealt with. I don't like this idea of having to undermine your ancestors, of ridiculing them, undermining them, and making less out of them. I think we're part of a historical process and I think that this attitude that you have to murder your father in order to start something new is bullshit. We are part of this culture, we don't come from outer space, so whatever I do is already something that has entered my brain from some other sources and is then synthesized into something new. I respect my elders and I learn from them. There's nothing wrong
with accepting that. I'm secure enough to accept those influences. I don't have anxiety about originality, I really don't.
Interview with Felix Gonzalez-Torres by Robert Storr
ArtPress
January 1995
Pages: 24 -32
By: Robert Storr
Jah Jah
DO YOU SEE WHAT RIAN MCGINNLY DOES TO MY WORK JERRY ???? IS THIS OK???? HE STUDIES THE HECK OUT OF ME AND U KNOW THAT IVE BEEN AROUND LONGER AND HOTTER.. SSO PLEASE TELL ME WHAT I AM DOING WRONG AND HE IS DOING SO RIGHT THAT HE CAN GET AWAY WITH USING EVERY THING I DO AS INSPIRATION _
Jerry Saltz
I go with Richard Prince on this one: "I'm not interested in 'making it new;' I'm interested in making it again."
I say steal from anywhere at any time.
Leah Anderst
Could the idea of drawing from the same wellspring of the spirit of the age apply here too? Certain styles and themes dominate individual periods and places, and without ever seeing each other's work, two artists could easily produce very similar pieces.
The question of plagiarism is clearly totally different than this, but just a thought.
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
I know, I know, I agree about the big babies thing, see the playground comment above. And there is a possibility that my ideas are pretty obvious, and that of course others are doing them, because they are not that original. I think I need to be OK with that.
Jah Jah
so its ok because he has some more prominent friends- and he can get paid more than me-- ok- then let everyone steal and I WILL BE ARMED AND DANGEROUS_ haha
Jerry Saltz
I am a big fan of the work of Benjamin Edwards. He was a student of mine at RISD, as was Julie Mehretu. Love 'em both as people. But there's no doubt at all that Mehretu got A LOT from Edwards; so much that in some ways she's doing his act. On the other hand, their work looks nothing like one another's and one is wolrd famous and one isn't. I still find M's work essentially decorative and think a good E. is REALLY GOOD. Oh well.
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
I love that Felix Gonzalez-Torres quote, it helps a lot. This from a guy who put a bunch of candy in a corner. And that was a great piece. But he did it first, that's the thing. (whine, whine) Maybe I need to think better, harder, longer and more thoroughly about my ideas. Maybe I just need to be BETTER and DEEPER conceptually. Gonzalez-Torres was prolific...that helps.
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
Leah, it's true. And when I remove my ego from this, I realize that that really is the most important point.
Kurt Kauper
I remember Lari Pittman dismissing criticism of artists who supposedly "stole" from him, saying "it's all public property." I think he got it right.
Brad Farwell
I've been studying photography within museums (ie tourists taking pictures) for a year or so now, traveled to italy, did some interviews with curators there and here at the Met, and then had the NYT do a front-web-page story about the concept before I had gotten anything out my door, product-wise.
Did I spend a day or three being pissy about that... Read More? Yes. But it reminded me that whole idea of the journey being more important than the goal is true; making this work has been extremely interesting and rewarding for me, whether or not I got it out the gate to the public first.
You can steal a product, but you can't steal the experience gained by making the product.
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
Perhaps Julie Mehretu is more popular because she IS decorative and that sells. And maybe she is better at marketing herself than the other one. I'm sad to say I have not heard of Benjamin Edwards.
Lori-Ann Bellissimo
I have encountered many other artists "copying" what I do...using my technique or at least trying to, using my imagery, using my size formats etc...I think there's room for everybody. The thing is I did it first. And my new ideas are always perculating...those "copycats" can try to keep up with me...I'm not interested. It's my personal legend to do... Read More what I do and everyone has their own path. From my early days of reading the likes of my fave crits like Thomas Albright it seems who does it best is at hand...Well I do it first and I do it best. I don't reason why it's just the way. The matter at hand is that it may not be immediately obvious to everyone at the time but why does it have to be. We re visit work all the time and I know my work stands the test of time...it's something that was ingrained into my approach and those "copycats" they play on novelty and fads. I'm busy building a body of work, a career that speaks of my life path and I know how to draw. I know I am truthful.
Kirsten Rae Simonsen
"You can steal a product, but you can't steal the experience gained by making the product." Thumbs up.
M.F. Tichy
Originality is a Modernist myth that is still partially clung to.
Jerry Saltz
Empress Jah-Jah: I don't see much resemblance between your work and RM's. He pictures a very close tribe of people; you picture a much larger tribe. His work is very much about him; yours is about WHO you are photographing and what they are doing; who they are or are not changing the world or creating culture; his work is more about white youth; ... yours is not limited in that way. His vision is very clear; yours is wider and therefore doesn't feel as personal. I am not saying it ISN'T personal, my Queen. You are multi-focused. He is singular focus.
Jerry Saltz
Rachel: Word.
Jerry Saltz
Kurt: Word.
Jerry Saltz
M.F. Word.
Sam Tan
Nothing is created in a vacuum, ever.
Sean Capone
When I say "thieves' of course I mean that in the best possible sense... :)
When we learn to read & speak, someone else came up with those words. I don't really believe that all art is stealing just because we learned how to draw or shoot film in formal ways.
Doug Henders
good artists borrow.. great artists steal - Pablo Picasso
Jah Jah
Jerry if he starts shooting Cowboys and my secret next project Im going to go after his head-- sorry but many important people like yourself have pointed out that he is trailing my work- the dust- then the smoke then the monochromes- I have a long history of photographing tribal youths- he is blatantly borrowing visual elements of my work that he is inspired - although in my work it is usually the actual situation as opposed to a totally staged composition. xo
Stephan Fowlkes
there is derivitive art and then there is art which capitalizes on what came before...
William Walker
Bad artists copy, great artists steal.
Not my quote.
Jeff Zimmermann
Simultaneaty (sp), osmosis, and influence are fair and honest. Stealing which we've all seen is cheap and really bs. It makes you not an artist but ripoff artist. C'mon...
Fiona Ross
I love to make things that surprise me. If "stealing" surprises me, well then!
Scott Groeniger
For me it's ultimately about who decides what work gets shown and why. So the idea that generated this topic "originally" for Kirsten and I was when we saw an artist's work that was very similar to an idea we had already explored "in theory" over a year ago come to prominence in a gallery setting very publicly. And when we saw this particular ... manifestation of the exact same ideas, the paintings frankly were SO literal... so OBVIOUS and so direct, that I was completely underwhelmed that a gallery curator would actually go for that work painted in that way. The paintings we saw would NEVER fly in art school. The execution was, at best, undergraduate level. Not that I really care that much about the technique of painting, however this was just astonishingly bad (and not in a good way).
So we began this process of deconstructing the notion of originality and the visual manifestation of similar, if not identical ideas. That led us to positing this issue to Jerry's FB site.
Jerry Saltz
Jah-Jah: I worship your musical self but i think you just made a v. strong case for how your work is totally different from yours. It would be fine with me if he photographed Cowboys next too (I presume Richard Prince would have no problem with that). Regal princess, no one owens anything. Regardless, his work has made a v. different point than yours. In the end it is about YOU not HIM. I beg your leave ...
Jerry Saltz
(I meant that J-J's work is "totally different from RM's")
about an hour ago
Jah Jah
Jah Jah
ok whatever- ill just work for Ryan Mcguinnly and hope i can get my rent paid from all his sales haha
Jerry Saltz
Jah-Jah: With your permission, I htink that in your inner-head you must leave the RM train of thought alone. It is irrelevant to what you do, how it is received, and what you will make. I am walking away slowly without turning my back to you, Oh Great Jah-Jah.
Jerry Saltz
Scott: What are you talking about? Who? What paintings? Since it was all public we need to know. Or it doesn't mean anything.
about an hour ago
Jah Jah
Jah Jah
thank u for your thoughts jerry you opened my eyes to another perspective:) bless
Sean Capone
Re: Felix Gonzales Torres quote--nice. That really said it perfectly. But I still think his ideas are better than his art.
Jerry: interesting connection between Edwards & Mehretu. I really like both, and see the connections without having known about their relationship. I could see them side-by-side in a themed show, however, without thinking they were biting each other's style. Maybe we should go back to the age of stylistic schools (AbEx, Impressionism etc) and duke it out that way!
Michele Gallagher
Hi Jerry -
RE Rae Simonsen wants to talk about "artists stealing ideas from other artists."
Dude Thats all the bitches seem to know how to do
Steal my Fing ideas
but because they are all hooked up with rich book and magazine publishers (bitches) they come out like Hey look at my book about crochet! They didn't give a Shiz about it till I was blogging it non stop Hence the stealing LOL But no worries I come up with original ideas every day they can't catch me... Read More
If too fast and dyslexic that works too
Love you Jerry
xoxo
crafty cameleon
aka lucky bastards club
P. Elaine Sharpe
As an artist I wondered often about my own responsibility in knowing the influences that passed from others into me. I remember my first moment of 'that bitch stole my idea'. I also recall the first time I saw someone else's work resolve an idea I had been roiling over, and did it so well that I gave up on the idea. No problem. I snoozed, I losed. ... Read MoreThe one thing that I find discomfiting, no matter how much I can rationalize it away, is when I make a work and then find out that someone senior to me has made similar work, and I have to stress the fact that it is the similarity in idea or concept that is most jarring, not the visual trope. Works can and do look similar, that's to be expected, but to work away on an idea that is borne of my own experience and thinking and to come upon it as executed by someone I should have known about, whether unexpectedly or have someone else point it out to me, is really a blow. If I steal or quote or pay homage, I prefer it to be a conscious act.
Ravenna Taylor
I am a nobody in the art world, but I've had artistic ideas "stolen" by people who are less and who are more accomplished, a couple times - an artist who took a studio space near mine, and another couple who were invited in for studio visits. Just seems like a good impetus to move on to me. I think artists who won't tell their secret medium's ... Read Moreformula, or whatever, are silly. Since I'm trying to make things I like to look at, if someone wants to help fill the world with my ideas, go for it. I'm no good at making myself famous. But I will just keep generating my ideas, which I will conjure out of my experiences, including my experiences of other art.
Susan Quaglia Brown
Where inspiration comes from is a mystery to me! I once unintentionally stole from an art critic! An artist friend was visiting my studio, commenting on my work, and I said "That painting is Jackson Pollock meets Andy Warhol." She looked at me astonished because she had just read those very words/analogy that morning in an art review about an ... Read Moreartist's work.
This kind of thing happens to me all the time, I pluck information out of the ether. Marie Louise von Franz (Jung's better half) wrote that we would be shocked to realize how un-original we actually are and how rare it is to have an original thought.
John Haber
It's important to recognize too that stealing has had different values in different times. Renaissance it's called doing your job or it's training. Pointillism it's ideology. Duchamp it's f** art. Walter Benjamin or Roz Krauss it's the death of the avant garde. Warhol it's that unique mix of love, loss, and detachment. Other Pop Artists its ... Read Morecelebration. Sherrie Levine's generation it's who owns art history. Now it's often self-aggrandizement. But it's never simply akin to copyright violation and is an essential part of the game.
Jerry Saltz
Hey: Get over to the REPOST. Everytime you post here now you'll delete someone above. I know you're all antsy to go for it but come on, be nice ....
Sean Capone
re: JahJah: "although in my work it is usually the actual situation as opposed to a totally staged composition". Isn't this the keystone of how your work is different than La McGinnley's? You are arguing about stylisms and effects.
Andra Samelson
didn't picasso say, "i never borrow, I steal"!
Jerry Saltz
I will pull this car over right now if you don't get over to the other post!!!!
Doug Henders
stealing is a form of homage. If someone is stealing your ideas and becoming successful then its a form of validation. Given the speed of information it will come your way shortly and the light will shine on you. Be ready.
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