Richard Prince, the world’s highest-grossing “photographer”
priceonomics.com
priceonomics.com
What a consummate jackass - not an artist, not an innovator, just a sleazy rip-off gutter dweller. He's essentially a fore-father for the mentality perpetrated by "The Fat Jew" on Twitter, who is, rightfully, being excoriated for making a business model of profit by way of theft. If Jeff Bezos or Elon Musk wanted to achieve something useful in the space race, they'd find a way to grab both those guys, shove them in a rocket on a one way trip to the moon, broadcasting a camera feed back to Earth, and with just enough water to make it there before they have to turn to cannabalism as a last resort before their inevitable, well-deserved end.
By Richard Prince's logic, I should totally be entitled to steal his identity and empty his bank account in the name of performance art. He doesn't believe in copyright? Fine. I don't believe in the illegality of stealing from thieves.
(Banksy's a good example. I'd really rather not have to see shitty graffiti all over the neighborhood. But when a Banksy piece turns up, I'm okay with it. Because I think his art is interesting and relevant.)
Prince's "New Portraits" series is shitty art. It's somewhere between tone deaf and behind-the-times. It's obvious. He's not adding anything interesting to the photos. He's not saying anything interesting about copyright. Etc.
But I have to admit I'm but of troll. The real treat is art snob fetishising over paint stains.
http://twentytwowords.com/canvas-painted-blue-with-a-white-l...
There's also "Voice of Fire" [0]. Same concept but uh... red and blue instead of blue and white. Really speaks to me ya know?
Don't forget Onement I [1]. The same painting, again, but brown with a yellow stripe! How does he come up with it!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voice_of_Fire
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barnett_Newman#/media/File:New...
From afar, it seems that being an artist is actually sort of similar to being a developer/entrepreneur. Let's say you're a technically able artist. You can create anything. But what do you actually deliver? How do you create "value" (i.e. a piece someone, somewhere, loves)
As a comparison: there are plenty of developers who can reverse engineer device drivers. But knowing which driver to actually reverse engineer, that can actually deliver value to someone, that's the tricky part.
I have respect for two things: Things that require such skill that other humans are not able to trivially reproduce it and things that are so damn simple that it is amazing it took us 10s/100s years to figure it out.
I feel there are two schools of thought. Those who "get" modern/contemporary art and those who don't.
Those who do say: "Yeah, you could have done this. But did you?"
Those who don't say: "I don't think I'd get paid $10 million for a 20ft canvas covered in my own feces and I don't think any reasonable person would. So they don't."
Looking back, I should have used a less criminal/more light-hearted example to try or made a better attempt at illustrating where I stand on these things.
[0] At least I hope this hasn't happened and there was at least some paint on them. [1]
[1] But a redditor did hang up 3 blank canvases on their wall out of laziness and others saw "art" in it. So there's that at least. http://i.imgur.com/oTKPb.png
I like this about it. He adds a banal, trivial, perhaps non-sensical comment that satirizes the emptiness and one-sidedness of communication on today's most popular social platform. And the timing was perfect.
Probably everybody would be laughing about this guy if he wasn't making big bucks. The problem is in the art market where millions can be made by just selling overhyped garbage.
Can anyone seriously make the point that a picture of a smiling woman is worth 1 billion?
And yes, many people can seriously make the point that the original, 1 of 1 version of the Mona Lisa is worth $1 billion because of the amassed cultural value and exlcusivity of the original, in that the demand for that one original painting far exceeds the available supply. Pretty simple, actually.
Those guys aren't collage artists. This guy isn't doing anything different than most collage artists. I'm sure you've heard of Warhol and Liechtenstein (sp?).
Long story short, this is free speech and clearly his buyers think his work has monetary value. The same way other works do - via market forces. The Mona Lisa's importance can't be quantified with a "cultural value" detector.
>Do I think their art is worth millions? Nope.
You don't get to make that assessment. The art market does.
And, for the record, yes, I do get to make the assessment that I, as an individual, do not believe Rothko's art is worth millions, and the art market can not force me to believing otherwise as a person. Am I allowed to pay what I believe it is worth? No, the art market does indeed set that value. Trying to split "market forces" from "cultural value" is, to me, a short-sighted proposition when in the context of art, which, by its inherent existence, doesn't have intrinsic monetary value (unless it's made from precious metals or stones or whatnot, which is a tangential notion of value).
Why is this a problem. If another artist cuts out stuff from a bunch of different magazines and makes a collage, does he owe money to every magazine? That would be absurd. Why should these photos be different?
No.
>and how much they sell for.
Perhaps. I guess it depends on the perspective you're approaching it from. As a use of capital resources in a world of crushing and grinding poverty, I say yes.
As a potential investment: if the someone is willing to pay more in the future then it's not bullshit.
Yes. Murial Gray (scottish broadcaster) has some amazing stuff about this. She had a TV show (Art is Dead, Long Live TV (1991, thus hard to find info about)).
Just as easily as i can make the point that a 100 dollar bill is worth 100 dollars
Because other people believe that to be its value.
It's music, TV shows, movies, posters, novels, games, that amazing dinner you had the other night, expensive stuff hanging in galleries, that goofy widget sitting on your desk, etc.
Art is awesome.
The problem is shitty artists who exploit the talent of others, but otherwise don't contribute much.
There are artists who are born to scheme. The art is the vessel, the craft is the thought. The concept is king and and to be successful is to create tight, conceptually sound pieces. To craft relevant and provoking statements out of abstract language. They better the world through debate and response.
Many successful artists combine the two but it's not a necessity.
I don't think you should dismiss somebody because they provoked you with their work. Your statement, your imagery of blasting him into space, is ultimately the execution of his piece. He built a frame and your comment filled it in.
Therefor, my review of Richard Prince and 6stringmerc's collaboration...
3 out of 5. Deductions made due to the cruelty of your "well-deserved end" bit. Maybe next time consider a scenario in which they are trapped and punished but are given an opportunity to redeem themselves through an exercise of traditional craft. Also a smaller deduction due to your trite invocation of Musk and Bezos. Even the most casual HN comment readers have explored their entrepreneurial motif enough.
Which, according to logic, makes people who successfully provoke others already artists half way. Not a very good definition of art in my opinion...
But it's not like it's an interesting reaction, it's so obvious. It's like when kids say "Hey look at that over there" and then "Made you look" when you look. You don't have a reason not to look, it's maybe funny the first time because it's so stupid but after it's been done over and over (and appropriation has) then there's nothing left. Or like an older brother who maneuvers his siblings hands and then says "Stop hitting yourself". These produce exactly the same reaction as the provocateur is intending but it's not an interesting reaction at all.
Personally, I think the only reason that this guy is famous is because some very wealthy people chose him specifically because he can generate an endless stream of his art so that they can buy and trade them to make more money. The art is an investment for them and has no aesthetic value.
I was talking about this with a friend, and she said if that was sufficiently transformative for fair use to apply, then one could simply write notes in the margin of a book, call it art, and claim ownership of the book's contents.
Of course it's worthless as culture, but rich people buy art as an investment and as store of value, and that only works past a certain price/name threshold.
If you can persuade art buyers that your "work" will be worth even more a few years from now, you can sell them anything at all.
It's not even appropriation art - it's purely a capitalist transaction, very possibly a knowing and cynical one.
Like a market for tulip bulbs[1]? ;-)
Buying one of his "works" is not any better or worse than trying to ride a bubble in the stock market.
He's just a money printing machine
Infinite logic recursion detected, abort!!!
That might not be the case if you're looking at the Saatchi collection or wandering about in one of Larry Gagosian's spaces, but they are the wild exception to the rule.
Also, I'm not sure whether this applies specifically to Prince, but this clause in the instagram policy would seem to suggest that Prince is at least violating Instagram's policy:
The Service contains content owned or licensed by Instagram ("Instagram Content"). Instagram Content is protected by copyright, trademark, patent, trade secret and other laws, and, as between you and Instagram, Instagram owns and retains all rights in the Instagram Content and the Service. You will not remove, alter or conceal any copyright, trademark, service mark or other proprietary rights notices incorporated in or accompanying the Instagram Content and you will not reproduce, modify, adapt, prepare derivative works based on, perform, display, publish, distribute, transmit, broadcast, sell, license or otherwise exploit the Instagram Content.He may not "believe" in copyright (though it would be awesome if someone took a photo of his "work" and what his reaction would be), but he sure as hell knows that it wouldn't survive through court.
He just doesn't care, though. "Even if they didn't give me permission, I'd do it anyway."
Such a rebel.
If only some random user took one of those images, and then he re-stole it without noticing until too late...
Also, I'm not sure how you can claim that "his work stands up as not infringement"; to my knowledge, he hasn't been sued over this so these pieces haven't been put to any legal test.
The ease of reproduction, which photography heralded more than a hundred years ago, only helps reveal this fiction to those still held in its thrall.
The cognitive dissonance between a nascent realization of lack of ownership and the belief in the fiction of ownership causes outrage, particularly in those who benefit from the fiction.
As for achieving economic security off of making art, that is a reality only for a very lucky and very tiny minority of artists. The overwhelming majority of those who benefit from art are the middle men.
We should carefully consider as a society whether we want to enable the middle men and a handful of lucky artists at the expense of almost all artists and the rest of society, who could well benefit from free and unfettered access to earlier cultural products.
There is a common idea when faced with abstract or conceptual art that "I could do that," or "my kid could do that." Usually though, you couldn't. I don't find the arguments in the article very convincing – to my eye he appears to be producing original works of art.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10672934
How the heck can Richard Prince's use of other people's works be considered fair use if quoting a single line from a song is not considered fair use?
If I take your picture, your image belongs to me. So it follows that if I take a picture of your picture, that also belongs to me.
Isn't copyright a wonderfully logical instrument?
This prompts me to think of the case where instead of taking a photo-of-a-photo, one takes a "series of photos in rapid succession of a series of photos also in rapid succession", a la taking a camcorder into a movie theater.
As was pointed out in the article, only if its transformative in some way does copyright give you cover under the "fair use" doctrine:
Prince’s appropriation was “transformative” enough to qualify for fair use. In the words of the presiding judge: “[Prince’s] work adds new meaning...and the fair use doctrine guarantees [him] breathing space.”
A simple picture of a picture without alteration would still be considered infringement under the current copyright laws.
Ever seen it happen IRL? Got a link?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barack_Obama_%22Hope%22_poster
I'm unclear on whether that was before or after it was revealed that Fairey had fabricated evidence.
Instagram itself does something comparable:
> By displaying or publishing ("posting") any Content on or through the Instagram Services, you hereby grant to Instagram a non-exclusive, fully paid and royalty-free, worldwide, limited license to use, modify, delete from, add to, publicly perform, publicly display, reproduce and translate such Content, including without limitation distributing part or all of the Site in any media formats through any media channels, except Content not shared publicly ("private") will not be distributed outside the Instagram Services.
Both Prince and Instagram are protected by U.S. law.
Ads are part of public spaces. Appropriating them into artworks is a pretty interesting thing to do, though of course the ad photographer union (so to speak) will oppose it.
They have entered into an agreement with the original owner to distribute on their behalf.
However, if you're not instagram and "new portraits" are not, then they do not have a license. More importantly I don't think instgram has right to sub license your content. So unless it is instagram selling these "art works" he's breaking the law.
But, he's got more money than most of you, so good luck proving that.
Not entirely: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cariou_v._Prince
No definitive decision, and the case was settled.
> No definitive decision, and the case was settled.
Both statements are factually wrong. I'm not saying I agree with the Second Circuit's decision, I'm saying that there was a definitive decision, the case was not settled.
And I'm not sure a single appeal constitutes "perpetual."
"The court found 25 of 30 works to be transformative fair use under its standard, and remanded the case to the lower court for reconsideration of 5 of the works under the Second Circuit's new standard."
"On March 18, 2014, Cariou and Prince announced that they had settled the case."
Seems like they mostly found for him, but not 100%. And before the lower court could have the final say, I'm guessing Prince settled out of court. The last thing he needs is any judgment against him. Seems like that could open him up to a flood of lawsuits.
So it's kind of ambiguous. And, yeah, probably only ambiguous because he has the cash to put up a fight.
As it happens I was talking with my family last night about making money from photography and different business models, and then I stumbled on this article. So that's part of why I found it interesting.
I also think it's generally interesting the effects that happen when you put a different frame around something and show it in a different context. An art gallery room full of huge Instagram pictures is weirdly appealing to me. Warhol's soup cans, too.
By adding value I just mean that his work sells for millions while the stuff he "cites" doesn't. That's the free market... I don't make any ethical claims about that—I just think it's interesting (and kind of funny).
EDIT: I'm sorry if this came off as aggressive, but somebody's downvoted me without answering my question. I seriously want to know why his actions are so terrible. What harm does this cause to anyone?
There are so many easy ways I could make gobs of money if I threw ethics out the window, and so few if I won't.
In my view this guy is a total assclown, and the "scare quotes" (I see them more as mocking than scary here, but whatever) are well deserved.
Maybe when creators see that, they will stop living their dream that at some point their things will magically sell and focus either on selling if they are in it for the money or on creating if they are in it for creating. And copyright will gradually become obsolete.
I think it would improve both selling and creating.
I'm going with the former.
Also, I don't like him or his concept of art. Maybe if he was donating most of the proceeds to charity with enough to make a living.
So far, none of the women Prince stole images from have sued him -- but one of them, a user by the name of “Missy Suicide”, has done something even better: she’s begun selling (wait for it) photos of Prince’s photo of her original photo. While Prince’s version sold for $90,000, she offers hers for a mere $90; all proceeds have been donated to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a nonprofit that fights to preserve digital content rights.