Photographic Plagiarism

david b · Jun 17, 2008

Sam Abell was interviewed this past weekend at Look3 in Virginia.

He was asked about the Richard Prince photograph.

If you do not know, Richard took a photo of a Sam Abell photograph and then sold it to the Guggenheim for something like $1,000,000 US.

Here is the video.

What do you think?

Vaughn · Jun 17, 2008

I think Sam has taken a very sane and thoughtful approach to this happening with one of his images.

And I think that Richard, in a very artful and clever way, has ripped off the Guggenheim Museum.

Vaughn

bdial · Jun 17, 2008

His reaction seems remarkably restrained. Like Mr Abell, I'm curious to hear the Guggenheim's response.

Pinholemaster · Jun 17, 2008

Sam Abell is pure class and intellect.

Too bad the collectors of Richard Prince's work have no idea what a thoughtful person Mr. Abell is.

David A. Goldfarb · Jun 17, 2008

Excellent statement from Sam Abell.

A curious thing is that I think Abell probably will get some recognition from the art world out of this episode, and museums are increasingly interested in blurring the lines between work produced as "art" and popular culture, and if they weren't they wouldn't have been interested in the Richard Prince photo at all. The Prince photo is only interesting as an appropriation of a pop culture icon, not unlike Warhol's Brillo boxes or Campbell's soup cans (did the designers of that packaging ever get any recognition for that? did they call it plagiarism?).

The price of the Prince photograph seems a bit of a distraction to me. I suspect Sam Abell was well compensated for the Marlboro campaign, and that might be why he can afford to be reflective rather than outraged. An artist who sells their work at a modest price, becomes famous, and then sees the work go for a high price in the secondary market won't have been so fortunate, though that's not a bad position to be in either.

lns · Jun 17, 2008

Wow. Thanks for posting this. I admire Abell for the decency and thoughtfulness of his worldview. But I still find Richard Prince's work fascinating in the conceptual sense. I think it's important. I may be alone here, but I can see why the Guggenheim would want to own and show it.

To Abell, the image is what matters, and he created it. To Prince and the Guggenheim, what Prince intentionally did with the image created the art. I imagine Prince would say, when I appropriate and collect these advertising images, when I contextualize them and make you think about the culture in which they exist, when I make you consider the meaning behind the banal advertising form -- I've created something new. And that is the art.

Whatever it is, I can see why reasonable people would differ about its value or importance as art. But I don't think what Prince did was plagiarism. Plagiarism (or rather, infringement of intellectual property) would be to set up and copy the whole cowboy theme for a different cigarette's ad.

-Laura

Saganich · Jun 17, 2008

Geeze, I've been incorporating advertising in my images for a while and had no idea I could make a million! I don't even care who the original photographer was, it is all corporate propaganda as far as I'm concerned, created for public consumption. I've consumed it and spit it out again with some of my internal juice dripping from the edges. The art establishment wouldn't exist without moneyed corporate sponsors filling their coffers and it is a good turn for them to give some of it back for a change. Prince is "cheeky" indeed to beat the Guggenheim with their own stick. Beat them harder and more often.

David A. Goldfarb · Jun 17, 2008

lns said:
I imagine Prince would say, when I appropriate and collect these advertising images, when I contextualize them and make you think about the culture in which they exist, when I make you consider the meaning behind the banal advertising form -- I've created something new. And that is the art.

Whatever it is, I can see why reasonable people would differ about its value or importance as art. But I don't think what Prince did was plagiarism. Plagiarism (or rather, infringement of intellectual property) would be to set up and copy the whole cowboy theme for a different cigarette's ad.

-Laura

I agree with this to a certain degree. I haven't seen the Prince photo in person, so I guess what I wonder is whether the object is really interesting enough to be collectible by a major museum, compared, say, to the work of Damien Hirst, which has both conceptual and object value. Does it make me think about advertising in a different or better way than a good critical essay about the Marlboro man would? As conceptual art, is the concept really that new or innovative? Does Marlboro man + irony = art still?

keithwms · Jun 17, 2008

Wow. Abell is a spectacularly sensible and levelheaded person. Lesser mortals would be hopping mad, I think.

Silly me, I didn't realize Abell was here at the thing in Charlottesville this week, I should have gone. Anyway the whole thing was sold out, all I got to see was some J-P Witkin. Which was quite thought-provoking, I might add.

Michel Hardy-Vallée · Jun 17, 2008

Prince's Marlboro work seems to me just like an extension of Duchamp's Fontaine. Which is fine, after all Duchamp opened a huge vein to dig for artists.

What bothers me is the absence of "share-alike" mentality. I couldn't find the article, but the anecdote was that a tourist was forbidden to take a digicam snapshot of Prince's reproduction of the original ad. If you're allowed to sample, I think you need to allow sampling in turn, just like the GPL/copyleft/Creative Commons type of license require to.

There's no culture without sampling or imitation, but playing selfish while at the same time lifting from other artists just stinks.

At least the Grey Album was distributed freely.

sun of sand · Jun 17, 2008

bdial said:
His reaction seems remarkably restrained.

I don't think so lol
you don't have to yell and kick

jstraw · Jun 17, 2008

mhv said:
What bothers me is the absence of "share-alike" mentality. I couldn't find the article, but the anecdote was that a tourist was forbidden to take a digicam snapshot of Prince's reproduction of the original ad. If you're allowed to sample, I think you need to allow sampling in turn, just like the GPL/copyleft/Creative Commons type of license require to.

Unless he's being a provocateur and making a thing out of appropriation. Not saying it is but 'no turnabout as fair play' could be a layer of the irony.

Michel Hardy-Vallée · Jun 17, 2008

jstraw said:
Unless he's being a provocateur and making a thing out of appropriation. Not saying it is but 'no turnabout as fair play' could be a layer of the irony.

Yes, a 1,000,000$ irony. I'm sure he's laughing all the way to the bank with his sophisticated wit...

jstraw · Jun 17, 2008

mhv said:
Yes, a 1,000,000$ irony. I'm sure he's laughing all the way to the bank with his sophisticated wit...

I understand that it's hard to contemplate the work without getting hung up on the price tag. At some level the two things are connected and at another, they're not. I'm sure to some it seems a great big scam. I'm sure to some, anything conceptual is difficult to take seriously.

Michel Hardy-Vallée · Jun 17, 2008

jstraw said:
I'm sure to some, anything conceptual is difficult to take seriously.

But conceptual art NEVER took itself seriously! If anything, it was a learned endeavour to bring back some fun into art.

The joke is on US because we took it seriously. That we decided to pay the high price for it is a good thing for the artists, but the case of Price is peculiar because it creates a double standard.

The problem is not an artistic one; it's an ethical one.

jstraw · Jun 17, 2008

mhv said:
But conceptual art NEVER took itself seriously! If anything, it was a learned endeavour to bring back some fun into art.

The joke is on US because we took it seriously. That we decided to pay the high price for it is a good thing for the artists, but the case of Price is peculiar because it creates a double standard.

The problem is not an artistic one; it's an ethical one.

Conceptualism is a broad concept that includes everything from the whimsy of the pop and op artists and surrealists, the irony of of the dadaists to the utter seriousness of the impressionists, cubists and expressionists. Conceptualism is anything where context or information beyond what's visible in the work itself is relevant to the appreciation of the work.

Some is humorous, a lot isn't.

I don't understand about the double standard or the ethical problem.

mabman · Jun 17, 2008

I haven't seen either the original Marlboro ad or the Prince version of it in person, but I have to admit I don't quite "get" what Prince was trying to do. I see he was doing a series on Cowboys, so I can see if he wanted to include a depiction of a cowboy as it appears in advertising, or in tobacco advertising specifically.

However, what I gather is that the Prince image is just of the cowboy and doesn't include any Marlboro logo or slogan. So, it's just a reproduction of a picture of a cowboy. I don't see how the image itself is any more special than any other picture of a cowboy - if it did include the Marlboro logo and/or slogan, I could it see it as a commentary of sorts, but without it, its original context is only known to a few (or maybe more if it's deliberately mentioned in the catalog/description, but then why not just include the logo and make it apparent to everyone?).

Or is this just a case of "art is what someone will pay for"?

tracy stjohn · Jun 17, 2008

look3

thank you david for posting that video of sam. he is a friend of mine and it was great to see the master out with gusto. Sam is synonimous with intregritiy, and we all could learn from watching his aproach to the real world of lossless craft.

Kevin Caulfield · Jun 18, 2008

Welcome, Tracy, I see this is your first post.

Can somebody please give a summary of exactly what happened, as it is not explained in the video. Was a portion of Abell's original photo re-photographed?

patrickjames · Jun 18, 2008

I can just hear Prince now.... SUCKER!!!!!!!!

It is pitiful, but no one is able to complain really except Marlboro (who surely owns the copyright) and why would they? They get free publicity from it. It glorifies their brand.

Prince has been sued before and was forced to settle if my memory serves me correctly.

The sad thing is the idea sells more than the images these days. This goes throughout the art world. Look at all the horrible work out there that is promoted as being great just because of the fluff idea behind it. The real way to success seems to be getting someone to buy into your schtick.

jd callow · Jun 18, 2008

Prince's idea is not so unique and it was done best (imho) by jasper johns.

timparkin · Jun 18, 2008

He didn't sell a photograph, he sold his instantiation of an idea. They are very different things and the idea, although not remarkably original, wasn't copied.

As an aside, when you take a photograph of a crumbling barn, do you expect to pay the original builder or the designer of the barn style? How about the land owner?

Tim

Mark Antony · Jun 18, 2008

Tim
I'm not sure thats true, what he sold was a copy of someone else's work not an idea he sold an actual hard copy.
I can't see how it would be any different for me to take a picture from great 20th Century photographer make a collage and sell it for XX.
As an aside if I take a picture of a barn I will ask permission to do that from the landowner, but I feel thats a separate issue because I'm taking 3D reality and interpreting it though my own vision, I haven't copied it, its very easily distinguished from the original.

To take any real object photograph or paint it renders it into something quite different from its original entity to copy a painting or photograph isn't quite the same.
But that's just my opinion, maybe we should just buy Laser copiers and copy Cartier Bresson work from books, crop them improve them and exhibit as our own vision.
Mark

Michael W · Jun 18, 2008

I read an interview with Richard Prince where he said there are some things that can only be said by using someone else's work. That makes sense to me. He also uses photos from Biker magazines. I certainly wouldn't call it plagiarism. It's more of a re-contextualisation. But if you already hate him then nothing anyone says is going to change your mind, right?

Early Riser · Jun 18, 2008

To me it's out and out plagiarism. The only creativity on Prince's part is the creative writing he does to justify this. Utter bullshit. This is why the average person thinks the art world is just a scam.

As for Abell, a class act.

Photographic Plagiarism

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