Chicago: Become Familiar with its Distinctive Neighborhoods

What about that topic gets your goat, Eazy? I kind of like Prince, but I know what Peter Schjeldahl means when he describes him as the "quintessential artist in his generation" and not in a good way (as though his impulses toward postmodernism are superficial).

Richard Prince, that is. Not the Purple One.

Today I hate:
* cars that need repairs
* and cost me money I don't have

Thank you that is all.

*Whiskers on kittens
*Stank purple mittens

^^^i read this like you were talking about Prince the musician, and it still sort of makes sense (except for the "not in a good way" part)

xxxpost

*Acerbic young women
*Wearing false eyelashes

Richard Prince's work is what bugs me about the article. The images he uses are visually arresting because a photographer, albeit on a commercial assignment, made it visually arresting. Somehow a photograph of a photograph seems more of a sham than what Warhol and Koons have done, and the idea that this other uncredited and unpaid photographer's arresting image is on banners all around the Guggenheim is just infuriating -- exactly like having someone same 'nasta or the FFs and have that unpaid "hook" be a top-10 hit earning millions for the "musician" who "made" it.

I rented a studio in the Gold Coast from 2002-2005, when I was working in the Loop and working a second job (the one I still do) as well as arty projects -- made sense to have a short commute, and it was at a time when rents were more reasonable (first two years they offered me a free months' rent to take the place).

I checked back with that building, and the rent is crazy now, $950 for a studio.

(like 'having someone sample 'nasta..., that should read)

I'm antsy. I've ants in my pants.

You don't say.

is that for a studio that you can live in or just a practice space type place?

http://cdbaby.name/g/u/gunnarmadsen01.jpg

Wouldn't it be fun to go outside and frolic in the snow?

Yes.

Well, it wasn't until reading that article that I realized that the Marlboro Man photos were taken by a living photographer that prided himself on his art. I'd always assumed, not having seen them in person, that they were from old 1960s print ads where the photographer thought nothing of his assignment and, at any rate, was likely dead. I mean, I guess Prince's work sort of queries the nature of commercial vs. fine art and anonymity vs. fame, which is interesting.

Your example of the unpaid hook in a top 10 hit is not quite analogous unless the artist who appropriated the hook was using it to make an artistic or intellectual statement. I agree that it would suck to be the dude who took the original photo and hear people talking about "that great Richard Prince photo," but part of what Prince is heralded for is not simply the beauty of the image itself but the theoretical subtext.

where the photographer thought nothing of his assignment

I recognize that this is a big assumption and probably a prejudice.

Is money the problem here? What if Prince took the photos, exhibited them, but chose not to sell them? What if Prince included Jim Krantz's name on the description next to the exhibited artwork? What if Prince sold them and gave Krantz half of the proceeds?

The thing is, the two images reproduced in the Times are really visually arresting and beautiful, compositionally. They were carefully staged, with a really talented eye (as the article says, the photographer studied with Ansel Adams). The photographer (or at least the agency creating the Marlboro ads) was definitely aware of creating iconic images; I wouldn't assume that he did so naively.

I think it's the credit as much as the money and the recognition: that Krantz's images are on banners on Fifth Avenue and on posters and on display in this museum, but somehow his photograph is not his own.

I had a friend steal a story of mine to make a screenplay of it, saying that ideas are just "in the air" for the taking. I see what he's saying, but I also think that's the point of view of someone who doesn't have many original ideas; I think Prince is appropriating this other guy's talent.

(different topic: Collete, it was studio with an unobstructed 7th floor view, a rooftop deck, and decent enough closet space, and bookshelves built into one wall. Not huge, but live-able. I loved that place, actually. Paid about $800/mo at the time, which made sense with the two jobs and getting to have a 10-minute commute to work and to live in the heart of the city. (This is how I spend my money instead of buying much of value, if you guys haven't figured that out already.))

xp I mean, I sort of read the work as an indictment of the art world and, by extension, himself, as a participant in the art world: like, "as soon as I remove the Marlboro logo, suddenly this is worth thousands of dollars, just because of who I am?"

but I also think that's the point of view of someone who doesn't have many original ideas

What about DJs who do remixes of other people's records? Would you say that they don't have many original ideas? I'm being deliberately provocative, but still.

djs who do remixes generally change the song they are remixing in some way, they don't just release the same song unmodified under their own name with no credit given to the original artist

xp Or is the difference there that permission is usually sought before said remix is released commercially?

Well, someone who is adapting a short story into a screenplay is also necessarily changing the story, right?

I guess I agree that credit should be given in all of these instances, but I don't want to claim that this kind of appropriation is always artistically bankrupt.

i think what prince is doing, as i understand it, is the definition of pretension, as he's basically saying "oh hi i'm recognizing value and beauty in this advertising that NO ONE ELSE CAN SEE (including the person who created the ad) until i point it out by contextualizing it as artwork."

which is lame

i'm all about recognizing the beauty in the mundane but i think it's more interesting on a personal level than have some dude going "DO YOU SEE? DO YOU SEE?"

having

I think that's only part of it. The problematic relationship between the original and the copy is itself one of the work's themes.

When Mr. Prince started reshooting ads, first prosaic ones of fountain pens and furniture sets and then more traditionally striking ones like those for Marlboro, he said he was trying to get at something he could not get at by creating his own images. He once compared the effect to the funny way that “certain records sound better when someone on the radio station plays them, than when we’re home alone and play the same records ourselves.”

this guy is fucking full of it

I don't see what's wrong with that quote.

i'm writing a book that will be a word for word duplication of the great gatsby. i am an author.

To me, it confirms pretty much what Nick was saying, that he thinks he sees something in a picture that other people cannot.

I mean, what's valuable about appropriation is that it encourages us to consider context. When Prince says he was trying to get at "something he could not get at by creating his own images," what he means isn't "I don't have anything to say, I'm uncreative, I think I'll just take a photo of someone else's photo and pass it off as my own," it's that if he simply took his own photo, it wouldn't have the same kind of contextual resonance. He's asking us to examine how and why context changes the way we approach art, and whether we even call it art, and I think that's really interesting.

i'm writing a book that will be a word for word duplication of the great gatsby. i am an author.

Is your name Pierre Menard?

chicago pierre menard

If you wrote a word-for-word duplication of The Great Gatsby, I wouldn't call you an author, but if you presented it for public exhibition, I'd be tempted to call you an artist.

He's asking us to examine how and why context changes the way we approach art, and whether we even call it art, and I think that's really interesting.

-- jaymc, Thursday, December 6, 2007 5:57 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Link

this makes more sense to me, but wasn't marcel duchamp doing the same thing like 60 years ago?

maybe he should take photos of his photos

ie urinal in a museum

his own, i mean.

i basically agree w/nick. of course context is important, but i don't know if i'm a fan of the way this dude goes about trying to control it and point it out.

i got motherfuckin' grapes with my lunch today. not real sweet but plenty sweet for a brutally cold winter day. motherfuckin' grapes man.

i've got lunch on my motherfuckin' mind grapes

this makes more sense to me, but wasn't marcel duchamp doing the same thing like 60 years ago?

Yes, which is why some people claim that art ended with Duchamp, and why, I think, Peter Schjeldahl bristles at Prince's success: it's just a compendium of well-worn postmodern techniques.

maybe he should take photos of his photos

But his own photos weren't Marlboro ads!

Maybe if he took photos of his own photos it would open some kind of pan-dimensional vortex and I would be able to see what he's seeing when he takes the photos of Marb ads.

I dunno, I like it for the same reason I like* the Lucky Pierre experiment where they had people listen to B96 through headphones for an hour and repeat everything they heard onto a tape. It's a defamiliarization device. We become more aware of things, like the banality of radio commercials, when they're quoted.

*theoretically, since I haven't actually heard it

interesting article on maglev trains.

P.S. That was a good discussion, thanks guys.

SO TRAINS

that's what I'm fucking talking about, first we need grade separation

(PS: Just remember, whenever you get fed up with my intellectual analyses of art, that if I wasn't interested in conversations like that, you likely wouldn't know me.)