Idea blog post #1: reproduction
“[Mandiberg's] casting of his sites as educational resources may qualify him as using the images legally. Yet, he hopes that 'Sherrie Levine gets really pissed. That would be funny, wouldn't it?'”
-Jana, Reena. "Is It Art, or Memorex?" Wired News. 21 May 2001. Web. 09 Sept. 2010.
“Levine’s treatment of the photograph, though appropriated, was not unaesthetic; she did not adopt the irreverence or casualness towards the photographic medium that could be found in certain photo-conceptualist practices...”
-Durden, Mark. "Frieze Magazine | Archive | Archive | Sherrie Levine." Frieze. Sept. 2009. Web. 09 Sept. 2010.
Annotated Bibliography:
Jana, Reena. "Is It Art, or Memorex?" Wired News.21 May 2001. Web. 09 Sept. 2010.<http://www.wired.com/culture/lifestyle/news/2001/05/43902>.
This article from Wired magazine is about Michael Mandiberg's work where he scanned Sherri Levine's work entitled “After Walker Evans”. Mandiberg requested to scan Levine's images post them online for anyone to download and print out at home. The Metropolitan Museum of Art allowed him to do so. Mandiberg admits to the work being a quip or joke about conceptual art and isn't really open to everyone to understand unless you know your art history. Walker Evan's estate owners saw it as infringement and Levine questioned his originality. Neither of them however, have the rights to their photographs (the MET does) so they have no case if they were to sue for infringement.
I am interested in reproduction as art. Photography is a medium of exact replication. It is the only medium that can have an exact reference to the physical world. So photography lends itself perfectly to reproduction. But art in many ways is about being original. Art is about coming up with concepts and ideas all on your own. It is almost forbidden to copy other artists work. Sherrie Levine has made her career by using photography to use other artist's works as her own. Copying. Stealing. Synergizing? Levine is taking someone's original idea and using photography and it's inherent nature to grow into something bigger than itself. She is owning the nature of the medium to her fullest potential. With my own work I've taken old paintings and photographs and turned them into something more my own. Think about Marcel Duchamp's L.H.O.O.Q. He uses iconic imagery and makes it into something new. Levine however is just directly copying the image taken by another artist. She is a photographer using her mechanics of the medium as her concept. This is what separates readymades from Levine. I think Levine is an her own place and Mandiberg is also in that place. I wish to make more work like Duchamp. I believe that as artists we have all of art history to our disposal every time we take a picture or paint a landscape. There is a reference to another artist or art work in whatever an artist is creating. It more about how much the artist tries to hide, embrace or abuse the influence of other artists. I enjoyed reading about Mandiberg's work. He is interested in authorship and reproduction and as a photographer I think about all of those things every time I pick up a camera.
Michael Mandiberg's website:
http://www.aftersherrielevine.com/index.html
Blogger won't let me post the website for the second quote which is:
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