Derivative Works

O.k., one more time. You really have to distinguish between accidentals and essentials.

 

As said before, the incidental factor here is that - at that time - the Mona Lisa had become the emblem for Art Adoration (it still is, seeing the lines of people waiting to glimpse the painting even today). Would it have been another painting, Duchamp would have to had used another painting.

 

So yes, without using the icon of the thing he was commenting on, Duchamp could not have done so (as effectively). There however is no property of da Vinci's painting other than the status it had acquired that make it such a necessary part of Duchamps's work. There is nothing you see, nothing da Vinci put into it, that is unmissable for Duchamp to make an effective statement. It is all in what people had made of it. Would any other work of art have occupied the same position instead of the Mona Lisa, it, and not the Mona Lisa, would have been what you would see in Duchamp's work. It does not matter what you actually see. It matters what it stands for.

And that means that Duchamp's work is in no way a derivative work.

True, Duchamp's work is in no way derivative. But it has become a cliche.

Its derivative because he incorporated another's image into his work. Its a legal definition of derivative. This is the basics of our disagreement.

inspiration:

Modotti - Composicion con Maiz,+Cartuchos y Guitarra

TINA MODOTTI Canana, maíz y guitarra. Impresión de negativo original del Comitato Tina Modotti. Trieste, Ita… | Museo nacional de arte, Tina modotti, Museo nacional

 

Derivative Work by me

[ATTACH=full]1378437[/ATTACH]

homage `a Modotti-Composicion con Maiz, Cartuchos y Ukelele

I like the picture, but I've never quite been able to work out whether a ukelele has two strings too few, or four strings too many.

I suspect the latter.

LMAO.....you started my day, both late and early, with a laugh.....

Concerning the subject at hand, Campbell’s Soup should sue.

Or not......

 

I hear you like Tomato Soup

Every photo is a copy.......

Concerning the subject at hand, Campbell’s Soup should sue.

Or not......

 

I hear you like Tomato Soup

Excellent idea. Clothes and shoes designers should chase the every picturesnapping human in the world.

 

p.s.: here is the very interesting turn How NFTs are fueling a digital art boom

U.S. Court Sides With Photographer in Fight Over Andy Warhol Art

Never mind all the judges. She should simply retaliate by taking a photo of Warhol’s silkscreen and selling it for even more!

The convergence of Art and Capitalism makes for some pretty fascinating stuff.

People will value anything and everything in surprising ways.

 

“She should simply retaliate by taking a photo of Warhol’s silkscreen and selling it for even more!”

 

Reminds me of the old Prince cover where he one-upped Dave Chappelle.

“Checkmate Judo Move”

 

Edited March 27, 2021 by Moving On

Excellent idea. Clothes and shoes designers should chase the every picturesnapping human in the world.

 

p.s.: here is the very interesting turn How NFTs are fueling a digital art boom

Wow, hope the computer drives don't break. Does that break the chain?

Thankfully, I don't have to pay too much attention to the capitalist side of art, though it's there lurking in the background, sometimes not unlike bad bokeh. I don't expect to make money from art and don't spend large amounts on others' art. My artist friends often give me work, as I do them, and art's not in my investment portfolio, at least to my knowledge.

 

I can't not think about it when looking at someone like Warhol or I'd miss too much, especially the irony of it all!

 

Maybe it's just that I've used up my allotment of outrage thinking about the excesses of athletes, corporate execs, Hollywood types, lobbyists, TV megachurches, and various monarchies around the world.

 

If the art speaks to me, it speaks to me, often* beyond the moral, political, or financial status of the artist or the art world.

 

*not always

Duchamp really did capture the central concept: Art is the idea coupled with sensibility.

Duchamp really did capture the central concept: Art is the idea coupled with sensibility.

Actually, Duchamp kind of pi**ed on all that.

Actually, Duchamp kind of pi**ed on all that.

 

Don't know where or when he "pi**ed," but you are wrong as usual.

Don't know where or when he "pi**ed

Urinal/pissed. Get it? Dada is sh*t was one of their rallying cries, which ties in nicely.

 

From the Dada Manifesto ...

 

“Dada remains within the framework of European weaknesses, it's still sh*t, but from now on we want to sh*t in different colours so as to adorn the zoo of art with all the flags of all the consulates.”

 

Duchamp really did capture the central concept: Art is the idea coupled with sensibility.

Duchamp was anti-art. I think he would have rejected, or at least laughed off, a formulation that began with Art is ... and then continued by specifying.

He had a (great) idea, and brought to it a (great) sensibility. Doesn't matter ehat he thought about it.

If you’re going to make it about his great idea, I’m not sure how you can dismiss what he thought about it. That risks is an absurd regress of meta-thought. What he thinks matters but what he thinks about what he thinks doesn’t? Huh? Why does one part of his thought get to count more than another part of his thought?

 

And, anyway, what was the great idea which he brought to sensibility? And how does that encapsulate what art is? The last question is, of course, intentionally tough. Because no idea can capture the central concept of something like art which Duchamp and many others believed didn’t have a central concept. One can attempt, but will fail every time, to box something in that refuses to be boxed in, especially in a sentence of 7 words. Art comes to us as an ongoing dialog through history, not as something defined per se.

If you’re going to make it about his great idea, I’m not sure how you can dismiss what he thought about it. That risks is an absurd regress of meta-thought. What he thinks matters but what he thinks about what he thinks doesn’t? Huh? Why does one part of his thought get to count more than another part of his thought?

 

And, anyway, what was the great idea which he brought to sensibility? And how does that encapsulate what art is? The last question is, of course, intentionally tough. Because no idea can capture the central concept of something like art which Duchamp and many others believed didn’t have a central concept. One can attempt, but will fail every time, to box something in that refuses to be boxed in, especially in a sentence of 7 words. Art comes to us as an ongoing dialog through history, not as something defined per se.

For someone defying defining art you are remarkably sure that no idea can capture the central concept of it (because - and you appear to be among the many others who you say agree - it would not have a central concept), and that it (what?) refuses to be boxed in. You go on telling us that art comes through an ongoing dialogue, i.e. art is something that uses a medium, and is something that can be discussed (though how about that "will fail every time"?).

That all requires an explanation.

Edited March 29, 2021 by q.g._de_bakker

it (what?) refuses to be boxed in

Art. And, no, I'm not saying it's central concept or defining idea is that it can't be boxed in. I'm saying you can't coherently state in 7 words what art is.

art comes through an ongoing dialogue

I'm not talking about a verbal dialog. No, I don't think Picasso was literally discussing something with the crafters of ancient artifacts but I do think he was engaged in a historical dialog with them.

i.e. art is something that uses a medium, and is something that can be discussed

A literal reading of the word "dialog" leads to this misunderstanding/fabrication.

Good points, Pavel. Da Vinci and Duchamp aren't even apples and oranges, i'd argue, but apples and cauliflower.

Wow I just came back to this thread. Apples and Cauliflower. I like that! And that is a key point. Dadism was all about the chance relationships between apples and cauliflower and non-sense and rationality. It arose out of the shock and horror of trench warfare in Europe WWI. My sense is that the artists felt the institutions and governments and their supposed rationality that society believed in, had utterly failed and brought about the most brutal and destructive war up to that time. That was the genesis of the movement though ideas were formulating a little before that.

 

Well at the least the discussion provides some motivation to actually further study Duchamp an the Dadaists. I found a decent general article in a e-zine called Artland. Here's the article. What is dadaism, dada art, or a dadaist? | Artland Magazine

Check it out. I may help inform this discussion.

I wonder if Duchamp was aware of Herbert Marcuse and his "One Dimensional Man". I think Marcuse would have argued that as much as one wants to posit their art as anti-art, the art establishment and community will still appropriate it and turn it into a commodity, thus neutralizing the arts intent to bring about revolutionary change and/or reform and absorbing it into the status quo. Example is when the Beatles hit the scene they were "revolutionary". A few years later, they're elevator music.

Example is when the Beatles hit the scene they were "revolutionary". A few years later, they're elevator music.

One didn’t negate the other.

Apples and Cauliflower

Da Vinci is to Duchamp as an apple is to an apple with an oversized worm sticking its head out of it.

Da Vinci is to Duchamp as an apple is to an apple with an oversized worm sticking its head out of it.

What a great visual analogy for Mona L. & L.H.O.O.Q.!