All artists are phonies, right?
Okay, maybe phony is kind of a strong word. And surely phony baloney is a strong meat. But Jeffrey Lewis' fabu blog entry "Rip-Off Artist" in the NYT's Measure for Measure blog on music makes a kind of good point.
How many truly original ideas are there?
Isn't it true that all artists are simply ripping off ideas they see around them?
I was once told by a theatrical director that I should try to watch other people audition as much as I could, steal all of their best ideas, and present my work as something that only I could do. It was the best advice I think I ever got as an auditioning actor. But it does make me feel a little cheap and dirty.
If you're a true innovator, or you know of other artists who are incapable of grafting any idea from other art because they are so pure, do tell, do tell.
But don't fret if you can't honestly think of these examples. I'm a fan of the phony artist who happily admits to being influenced by tons of factors when creating art. It helps me know better as an artist myself where to look for the best stealable ideas.
2 smart alecky remarks:
accusations of phony-ness and this whole dynamic are part of the destructive mythologizing of art. Art is like language, if we claimed ownership or exclusive rights to a word, that word would have no meaning. Same with art, every creation is informed by and built out of what came before it. All anyone does is remix, some of those remixes can be very novel and exciting, others are simple rehashings of the same old thing. Originality is not an absolute, is a spectrum of values, defined by what you're mixing together and how you're mixing it.
This reminds me of a great scene from "Swingers." The one in which the guys are sitting around the diner table, ala Tarantino's "Reservoir Dogs," talking about how every great film maker rips off of the greats that came before them. I think an artists influences are clearly evident in everything they do. My writing is certainly influenced by my favorite authors and sketch comedy groups. I think it's inevitable that a comparison to an previous source will be made whenever any sort of art is exhibited. I have to begrudgingly agree in part with Rex in regards to his "remixing" comment. I think it's up to the artist to add as much as they can to the base that was laid by their mentors. This is, of course, if they want to avoid being labled a rip-off artist.
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