Responding as a Creative

There's been a lot of talk about the actions of Richard Prince, who sold screen captures of other people's Instagram photos in the Frieze Art Fair in New York. Most of the screen grabs sold for $90,000 each. If you haven't heard about this, The Washington Post ran an article about it on May 25th.

Yes, this image is mine. And it's registered.

It becomes an important issue because of how the internet handles images. Its easy for one to save images from the web and use them as their own. If you're thinking that this only affects you if you use Instagram, you might be interested to know that Facebook owns Instagram.

When I first read this article, I wanted to rant about the importance of registering your work for copyright (that rant will happen, just not today). On copyright, I will say, everyone should do it, especially in today's digital climate. It will not always protect you, but not registering your images is a surefire way to damage any case you might have.

What inspired me to finally write this, is the response by the Suicide Girls, a community of "alternative pin-up" photographers and models. They created their own screen captures of their Instagram images, recreated the prints sold by Prince, using the same canvas, same dimensions and added a new comment, referring to their captures as "true art". However, these prints are selling for $90 each and the money goes to The Electronic Frontier Foundation. This is the way to handle an issue like this, because the legal arguments would start to be more about how "transformative" Prince's subtle modifications are, I think it's better not to make this one a legal issue. 

This example also shows a healthy way to respond to questionable actions online. It helps that the "fight fire with fire" vibe appeals to my more stubborn side. If you consider yourself a creative, or artist, or whatever term you identify as, you have at your disposal an immediate coping mechanism and a go-to mode of expression. If someone misuses your art, make more art. it's really a beautiful move. And something I need to act on more in my life. I have a few photographic projects I could probably make using my frustration as fuel. I need to get on that. 

Further reading/sources
The Washington Post
Distractify