On a whim last night, we decided to put some of the blank canvases laying around the apartment to use. With limited resources (aka "no paint"), we cobbled together a copy of this Christopher Wool piece using some black painter's tape and an exacto knife...
We found some inspiration online, via Nick Olsen's faux Franz Kline (above) and decorator Michael Bargo's storage-masking homemade abstracts (below). According to Nick, "If I can't get the real thing, I fake it." We couldn't agree more.
What about you? Do you have any art in your home that you've made yourself? What artists do you feel you could successfully plagiarize? Post links to photos in the comments!
Images via DominoMag.com
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Oh no! This is terrible. The angles! The cropping! This misalignment! If you're going to rip something off, at least do it well.
I couldn't see purchasing the original Marimekko fabric to create wall pieces, so I painted them myself:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/30160010@N07/2904867653/
i wholeheartedly agree with jenc. and successful plagerism??? come on.
I have some I've lifted from other people. Dh is military and we don't have tons of money to decorate the house, but I still have a desire to make the house look lovely. So I make art for the house myself or I buy something cheapish (like the whatisblick.com decals) and turned them in to canvas art. You can see pictures at: http://geekdetails.wordpress.com/
Wow, jenc, tell us what you really think.
My art student daughter and collaborated on this piece:
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3264/2903353446_32221983a1_b.jpg
And I'd like to add that I'm a HUGE believer in DIY art. What do you think "folk art" is really all about? So what if DIY art is not made by someone "important" to the art world? It's more meaningful if it was made by one's own hands, or the hands of a loved one. So get out those canvases, exactos, black tape, what have you, and get to it, I say!
I think we're talking about two VERY DIFFERENT things here:
1) Creating original artwork yourself.
2) Making copies of artwork created by other people.
If I'm not mistaken, the post was about the latter of the two. Most of the comments, however, seem to be in response to the former.
Confusing!
By the way, art IS art. It's DIY by nature. There's no qualification a person needs to have to call themselves an artist. It's something that stems from a need for visual self-expression. I don't think this is ever a bad thing, regardless of the aesthetic judgement that might later be put on it by others.
That is a very different thing, though, than creating a facsimile of someone else's work for the sake of making your walls pretty.
i am agreeing with anna @ d16. being inspired by other people is cool. like if you wrote "AR T" or something that hasn't been done. that is an homage. but trying to copy something line for line is not cool.
Anna at D16, good point. Didn't realize that this particular piece of art was plagarized. Not a fan of that.
thanks Anna at D16 for your post(s).
advocating plagerism, sorry, brings this site to a new low, even if it's something as cheap as using tape. DIY is something else entirely. most artists appropriate, but that's not out and out copying. if you are going to appropriate, bring something of your own self to it. that's DIY. the bad christopher wool rip off is just that, bad.
Was anybody else a little put off when they found out that the Cole & Son wallpaper in 'SF House Tour: Monique and Richard's Apartment at a Glance' was actually photocopies? That made me really sad.
Calling a DIY copy of an artwork made expressly for your own home "plagiarism" seems a bit silly. Especially for abstract or minimalist artists such as Christopher Wool. If anything it seems like more of a reference. A way of saying "I like Christopher Wool and wish I could have the real thing in my home." The point isn't to create new art, it's to reference a style, which is what most interior design seems to be.
I thought that using photocopies of the oh so popular Cole & Son tree wallpaper was very clever. #1 not everyone has the money to spend $200 per roll of wallpaper and #2 they changed the size to fit their space. To me, plagerism is when you either copy someones work and pretend that it is your own work, or when you copy the work of another and sell it as an original, as in forgery. But I don't see who is harmed here...
"Imitation is the best form of flattery"
The plagarism issue aside, the original works because the artist paid attention to the letterforms. See how the vertical axes are shared? See how the widths of the letterforms are the same? It's the composition that works...the letters are abstract shapes. It's all about *seeing*, not reading. If you don't get it, if you think this "copy" is anything like the original, than you don't really see the original.
From the above comments, there are a few pompous asses that think art is important. It's not ,it's just fun. Dali said " The one who doesn't copy doesn't produce." The great Hunter S. Thompson learned his style of writing by literally copying word for word "The Great Gatsby". Learn and make art any way you please and forget about your detractors.