42"X24" oil on canvas stretched over panel. (heavy as hell)
here is a question: how much do you all steal? there's the picasso quote..."bad artists copy, good artists steal." what do you think the difference is? do i steal too much? do you think you might?
what are some source materials you use to make any particular painting?
here are some things i feel like i "stole" to make this painting:
donald judd
david schnell
mythraic cults
wallpaper
matthais weischer
and tons of google image pictures that i did not take myself....like stuff of houses, clouds, grass
and carpeting.
maybe this would make some interesting post ideas. y'all need to post more stuff so's we can
keep this goin'. and as always...be honest as hell with me. i can take it...i swear. i would love it if someone tore my shit apart.
thank you and have a good weekend
bradner
8 comments:
hahaha!
I'm trying to keep up with the fucking amazing depth of the first post ner'. But greaat topics, it is juicing me and I'm blushing. anyway
i dont think you steal too much. Good scientists read Einstein.
I think the difference is that bad artists simply copy, and have nothing to add, while good artists incorporate other artists' work into their own ideas/vision.
Honestly, I think the concern is irrelevant--and I'm not trying to sound harsh here--and I have to wonder if it's ever been relevant to art, with one exception: if I purposely imitate your work and sign your name to it and thereby profit from it. This, to my mind, is stealing. But assimilation is a natural social process. People want to fit in with people; artists imitate the work of artists they admire. We all, excluding perhaps truly Outsider artists, have an artistic family: a group of artists that we admire and have been influenced by. We imitate their styles; we study their content and subject matter; we borrow their ideas. I don't consider it stealing. I think that some petty critic, or some petty/insecure artist, looked at it this way at one time, and maybe understandably so--like during the times of court painters when a painters livelihood depended on pleasing a monarch--but I really think that the matter is much more complex, and calling this practice stealing is just a gross simplification, especially in this day in age of appropriation, technology and mixed media. Again, though, there definitely seems to my mind to be a gulf between good and bad art, and I think that good artists are able to take all of their influences and marry them to their own ideas, or reorganize and present these "done" ideas through a new prism because of their own thoughts, concerns and preoccupations.
Source material: in part of my lamb series, I used a pebble grain or patio pattern that Jasper Johns used in a big painting called Wall Piece, 1969, 27.5"x40", I think. I photocopied a small image of the painting, and then blew the pattern up on my paintings, or drew its likeness in by hand. It became an element in the series. I changed the scale. It was a pattern that intrigued me; and it was also, I felt, a way of acknowledging that, yes, I admire JJ, and consider him to be a major influence. Eventually, I began to break up the actual pattern to its smallest elements, and then began to use these elements in other paintings as the series progressed. The look became what people began to call the "cells" in these particular paintings (refer to the attic).
cool. thanks for the comments. the reason why i brought up the whole thing of stealing is that one time i emailed this artist (http://www.elizabethhuey.com/hypnagogic.html) whose stuff i really liked and it was inspiring me. i told her so and i said something like "i'll probably steal some of your ideas." i thought it was obvious that i wasn't going to flat out copy her stuff but she sent me back this patronizing email about "how would you like it if i stole your TV" and she even said she didn't want me to use any of her source material. WTF? she has an MFA from YALE. i guess i was a bit presumptions in the email though to say i'm gonna steal stuff but....i just thought she'd understand. painters are always saying they steal stuff right? everyone i know does anyway...
Yeah, that lady was a buttface.
When I paint a painting I do not steal or copy from any other artists. I paint completly from the subconscious. I use NO source material --- only paint and brushes and oil.
This lends itself to painting an emotionally honest painting. A purley original painting.
However I have directly ripped off Jasper Jhon's and painted some flags.
I do steal napkins from restaurants and creamers and sugars from cafes. I like to have them in my studio in case I run out.
Why would and artist want to copy something from a computer screen? Or from a photo? Is there not enough informatation out there on a daily basics to go into your mind----then later to tap into and put into your art---therefore becoming a direct representation of the day time and week you are living in.
I personally feel when one steals or copies from others --- they no longer are making an original piece of art.
But hardly how can one make an original piece of art these days. If I took a pee on your car windshield and you video taped it --- it would get more ohh and ahh's than a really great painting.
But back to the point---your a painter yeah? How about NOT stealing anything except some sugar and making a truly original painting.
I have seen your work It is quite nice, but how about no coping ...
and
seeing
what
comes
out.
is this important?
What did Picasso steal anyway some wallpaper from Matisse?
ORIGINAL ART IS WHAT MATTERS.
ORIGINAL EMOTIONAL ART.
I often paint from photo references...usually my own but not always. And when you think about it, even if I took a photo of crumbling brick, I didn't fire the bricks or lay the wall, or do the weathering. Photography could be seen as the creative cropping of what's already there. But by taking it into your lenses, tranfering it into muscle motion, and contemplating brushstrokes and pigments, you are interpreting it using your own unique Rosetta Stone.
I think I have to respond to Three Red Stars real quickly...have we met?
I'm afraid I have to contradict you completely. There is absolutely no way that you don't pull your experiences into your work. And experiences = source material just as much as a Henri Moore sculpture does. If you had never even seen a piece of artwork by someone else, you wouldn't know what to do with a paintbrush.
I respect that you make a conscious effort to tap into your own ideas, but ideas aren't (and can't be) original. In the words of Fugazi, "Language keeps me locked and repeating."
That said, I'd love to see your works -- and not to say "A-ha! That brushstroke is just like Rauschenberg!" Rather, to gather experiences on what someone else perceives as a primary source.
p.s. I've seen installations made entirely of sugar packets and little creamers.
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