From: Nicholas O'Brien (email suppressed)
Date: Tue Jan 05 2010 - 10:25:09 PST
Eli + all ::
AMEN! I couldn't agree with you more about Lessig + acolytes; the legal
conversation hinders the aesthetic concerns of remix culture. The age of
Vanilla Ice and his sampling controversy seemed to frame the conversation
around this issues for the past couple decades. The argument haphasdardly
spills into internet piracy (partially thanks to youtube/viacom/WB
sensoring) versus amateur enterprising (again not for profit), as opposed to
talking about how this "new" form has shaped (and grown) into a cultural
phenomenon. I understand the need to differentiate between gallerists and
youtube poop (http://youtubepoop.wikia.com/wiki/The_Youtube_Poop_Wiki), BUT
I want to avoid perfering one over the other, since I feel both have
outstanding outputs and audiences. I appreciate Lessig for providing some
jargon, even if the application over/under-shoots the importance of these
"movement" (again using the term loosely).
Even further removed for the OP, I also prefer to encompass/include mash-ups
into the glitch conversation (data-bending/moshing, corruption, Creative
Problem Creation (a phrase via Jon Satrom)) because of the cultural
similarity of responding and critically engaging in/with popular cultural.
But maybe that's another conversation...
best
On Tue, Jan 5, 2010 at 11:30 AM, Eli Horwatt <email suppressed> wrote:
> Hi Nicholas,
>
> I acknowledge my use of the term amateur could be controversial, and I
> do not wish to open that can of worms. I assure you I am using it in a
> more venerated way, having devoted much of my research and activities
> to the phenomena of digital remixing on the Internet. That said, there
> is clearly a difference between the people who exhibit their work
> exclusively in digital remixing circles on the net and persons who are
> exhibiting their work in galleries, trying to get grants and taking
> part in the larger conversation about the formal methods of
> appropriating images in the art world.
>
> I would like to offer a critique of how we are discussing this subject
> in the first place.
>
> While Lawrence Lessig and his disciples (like Brett Gaylor, director
> of RIP: A Remix Manifesto) are discussing this issue from a defensive
> legal perspective--attempting to articulate the legitimacy of taking
> intellectual property and disrupting the attempts of corporations and
> individuals to keep fixed the signifiers they have created, they are
> overwhelmingly not engaging in an analysis of the aesthetics and
> strategies enacted by these works. This legal defense is important on
> a practical level for artists. However, I think for the rest of us, it
> is important to not be totally consumed by the endlessly rehearsed
> legal arguments surrounding appropriation. It has rendered the
> conversation about reuse and recycling stale and static. We all know
> that fair use (or fair dealings) laws should protect this form of
> transformative speech and we all know that they often do not do so.
>
> I think this conversation should also begin to focus on "the work"
> rather than the legal doctrines surrounding it. I wonder sometimes, if
> recycling and reuse were to be totally legitimized by law, wouldn't
> derivative works just become totally homogenous, uncritical and
> innocuous (as so much work already has)? Is the current (precarious)
> legal situation an important part of keeping this practice radical and
> free from commercial co-optation? Of course, this question may not be
> taken lightly when you're an artist being sued by a major corporation.
> But for the invisible amateurs out there, it could be an important
> element of their practice. I do hope to see stronger fair use laws,
> but in the meantime, I think other avenues should be explored.
>
> Best,
>
> Eli
>
>
>
>
> On Tue, Jan 5, 2010 at 11:10 AM, Nicholas O'Brien
> <email suppressed> wrote:
> > There's the amateur word! I know Eli isn't using it as a negative (or
> > venerated) term, but it's an interesting word choice nonetheless (since
> if
> > my memory serves me correctly, there has been a good amount of
> conversations
> > on FW about that topic). I think perhaps a starting point for the "litmus
> > test" could be found in discerning the difference between how the amateur
> -
> > persons who participate in their creative activity for joy rather than
> > profit - and Hollywood (allow me to use that term loosely, thx)
> manipulate
> > found-footage. Lessig differentiates these motives as the difference
> between
> > read-only and read-write culture. The emergence of fair-use (mostly
> internet
> > based) appropriation in remix culture is different because of the amateur
> > element. He sez (mind the paraphrasing), that because remix/mashup
> culture
> > possesses TRANSFORMATIVE properties of the original source material, it
> is a
> > completely new work, and thus can't be stigmatized with
> typical/tyrannical
> > copyright infringement laws. This transformation (at best, critical
> > reflection upon image/media making), is something taught (perhpas
> > unknowingly) to the mash-up generation via found-footage films. I agree
> that
> > found-footage films are different from mash-ups, but not because of
> > technical (or time-based contextual) reasons. Instead (and I know I've
> > already diverged from the OP too much already), one significant
> difference
> > between the two forms is in the accessibility of one over the other (in a
> > non-pejorative way). Mash-ups typically use readily available resources,
> or
> > else readily recognizable popular iconography. Thinking of DJ Food's
> Raiding
> > the 20th Century, most of the audio we hear is something not found in
> > typical crate digging hip-hop sampling, but instead the top 10-radio hits
> of
> > the past two decades. Likewise video mash-ups typically have almost
> > immediate understanding of a premise based upon the common familiarity of
> > content and sources (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEWjrxm2UrA). I
> don't
> > know if this really helps, but it's a convo I love having. Also to check
> out
> > is RIP! A remix Manifesto: http://films.nfb.ca/rip-a-remix-manifesto/ (i
> > want to start incorporating this into my syllabus as well).
> >
> > best
> >
> >
> > On Tue, Jan 5, 2010 at 9:31 AM, Eli Horwatt <email suppressed> wrote:
> >>
> >> Yes, it does depend on what you're talking about.
> >>
> >> The use of the term mashup in reference to all found footage work of
> >> any kind is simply wrong. Obviously there is no litmus test, but I
> >> would say this term is used to represent the work of amateur editors
> >> on the Internet interested in narrative assemblage from various
> >> mainstream sources usually for the purposes of détournement.
> >>
> >> Eli
> >>
> >> On Tue, Jan 5, 2010 at 8:07 AM, Stephen Morgan <
> email suppressed>
> >> wrote:
> >> > It all depends on exactly what you're talking about, I suppose.
> >> >
> >> > In the first half of the 1980s, a bunch of young 'anti-artists' in the
> >> > UK,
> >> > some influenced by hip-hop turntablism, started appropriating 'found
> >> > footage' in a practice which became known as 'Scratch Video'.
> >> >
> >> > Andy Lipman wrote an interesting piece entitled 'Scratch and Run' for
> >> > City
> >> > Limits in 1984, which can be found here:
> >> > http://www.earthlydelights.co.uk/archive/scratch/scratch.html
> >> >
> >> >
> >> > S.
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >
> >> > On Tue, Jan 5, 2010 at 7:32 AM, Fred Camper <email suppressed> wrote:
> >> >>
> >> >> I'd like to question the use of the term "mash-up."
> >> >>
> >> >> I remember being startled a few years back by an article in "Wired"
> >> >> magazine that referred to Arthur Lipsett's films as "mash-ups."
> >> >>
> >> >> The term itself suggests its origin in pop music, and an informality,
> a
> >> >> rapidity of construction perhaps, that feels, to me, thoroughly wrong
> >> >> for
> >> >> Lipsett's films, or, say, Brakhage's "Murder Psalm." "Found footage
> >> >> films"
> >> >> or "collage films" are already-existing terms that seem better.
> >> >>
> >> >> Of course there may also be more recent videos for which the term
> >> >> "mash-up" is appropriate, and of course I understand that some may
> >> >> disagree
> >> >> with me and go on using the term for all such films.
> >> >>
> >> >> Fred Camper
> >> >> Chicago
> >> >>
> >> >>
> >> >> __________________________________________________________________
> >> >> For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.
> >> >
> >> > __________________________________________________________________ For
> >> > info
> >> > on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.
> >>
> >>
> >> __________________________________________________________________
> >> For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> > Nicholas O'Brien
> > doubleunderscore.net
> >
> > __________________________________________________________________ For
> info
> > on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.
>
>
> __________________________________________________________________
> For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.
>
-- Nicholas O'Brien doubleunderscore.net __________________________________________________________________ For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.