Back in the 80s, artist Richard Prince took a picture of a picture of the Marlboro Man and sold it as art. The original photo by Jim Krantz was part of an ad campaign to sell cigarettes. Talk about "branding!" What Prince did was liberate a cultural icon, the cowboy, from the sales force. His re-image is sort of a parody - humor so sophisticated that it's not even funny. The dialog between those two seemingly identical images is not about craft, but meaning.
Did Prince's copy lessen the value of the original photo? No, I'd say Krantz's stock went up on the notoriety of his cowboy and its doppelganger. Similarly, Shepard Fairey's "Obama" portrait, appropriated from an API photo, now hangs in the National Gallery with compliments from photographer Mannie Garcia.
Richard Prince compares the contextual effect of his work to the funny way that "certain records sound better when someone on the radio station plays them, than when we’re home alone and play the same records ourselves." I get that. It also reminds me of how the musical group The Doors, in the final four notes of their hit song "Touch Me," took the tag line "stronger than dirt" from Ajax, the white knight of scouring powders, and freed up the underlying musical cadence in the name of art.
I too have scrawled portraits aplenty like
my "Rod Serling" done after a publicity photo, but I don’t sweat copyright issues thanks to the "parody" rule and fair use. My renditions look like cartoons. I also interpreted a dozen famous images from the Detroit Institute of Arts collection without once thinking that the DIA, or the artist's estates, might object. The fact that they sell my art cards in the gift shop is an encouraging sign.
I don't claim anyone else's idea or creation as my own and always give credit where due. Yet, in a world where everyone seems to be packing a picture phone or camcorder, there are bound to be duels in the gray areas. Frankly, I'm more wary of lifting musical motifs than visual imagery. There's something about a melodic fingerprint that keeps me from replicating too closely any existing tune - but I still scoff at the judge's decision that George Harrison's "My Sweet Lord" plagiarized The Chiffon’s "He's So Fine."
Then there’s the vintage Indian-head TV test pattern that I recreated as a screen print. With a retro-style mahogany frame and a custom-cut 50's era gold metallic picture-tube mat, I elevated that antiquated broadcast paraphernalia into art. Since then, I've been looking over my shoulder thinking that RCA might have a bone to pick with me, especially when they learn I've been earning tens of dollars off of that familiar chart. I've stopped losing sleep though and I'm pretty sure they've let it slide - although with the stock market in its swoon, even corporate behemoths are scrounging revenues.
Television has come a long way. The picture quality is awesome. Of course, the Stanley Cup Playoffs are my only excuse for watching TV but...
...(Read the rest of this essay in The Intellectual Handyman On Art, a new book by Gary R. Peterson from iUniverse.)
