Digital Prohibition: Piracy and Authorship in New Media Art by Carolyn Guertin:

In the first book to discuss the global politics of creativity and emergent models of authorship in a digital age, Guertin explores the creation of new media forms by artists who use technology to challenge established modes. Redefining authorship within remix culture, the book identifies the potentialities in the social nature of electronic works to foster new creative practices - from sampling to mashups to digital anthropophagy - on a global scale.

Carolyn Guertin holds a dual appointment in digital media — as Assistant Professor and Director of the eCreate Lab at the University of Texas at Arlington and as a member of the graduate faculty at Transart Institute in Berlin, Germany. Continue reading

Posted by Andres Manniste on nettime: Vincent Gallo versus Jillian Macdonald:

Artist Jillian Mcdonald has run into trouble with Vincent Gallo, who is represented at the Whitney Biennial this year. It is about her 2004 work, “To Vincent, With Love.”

Incidentally, the Whitney actually has a version of this work in their Artport. I find this all very confusing.

She writes, “I just received a cease and desist letter from Vincent Gallo’s attorney suggesting I added no creative material in making my video (which took me 8 months to make in 2004), To Vincent with Love. Also this letter claims I am causing him personal injury. It also demands I keep the letter confidential, and that we reach a settlement to be paid to Mr Gallo.” Continue reading

From The Anti-Piracy Discussion We Haven’t Had Yet by Scott M. Fulton, III on ReadWriteWeb: Continue reading

Artists!

The US Congress is about to pass an internet censorship bill written by the copyright and corporate music and film lobbies, claiming that this bill is written in your name to “protect creativity.” The law would allow the government or corporations to censor entire sites — they just have to convince a judge that the site is “dedicated to copyright infringement.”

In fact, PROTECT-IP Act (PIPA) in the Senate and the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) are backed and largely written by the Hollywood film industry, namely the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), which is trying to sell goods and ideas that are already free. Continue reading

From The Anti-Piracy Discussion We Haven’t Had Yet by Scott M. Fulton, III on ReadWriteWeb: Continue reading

Bad for artists? On digitization, remuneration and copyright by Leonhard Dobusch, Eurozine:

According to recent research, it is not illegal copying that is threatening the livelihood of artists, as record companies tell us, but an inequality built into the existing copyright system itself. Leonhard Dobusch on why, in a winner-takes-all culture, stronger copyright protection only benefits the few.

“In what follows I want to make three points. First, that digital technology is not the problem – neither in general nor for authors and artists. Second, that remuneration for artists is, however, a problem. Third, that stronger copyright is not the solution. Continue reading

July 2011 on –empyre soft-skinned space: Reclaiming Creativity as Agent of Change :: Moderated by Simon Biggs (UK/ Australia) with co-moderator and discussant Magnus Lawrie (UK) and invited discussants, Shu Lea Cheang (Taiwan/ USA/ France), Paolo Cirio (Italy), Jussi Parikka (Finland/ UK), Saul Albert (UK), Julian Oliver (NZ), Michel Bauwens (Belgium) and Simon Yuill (UK).

Established during the so-called “age of discovery”, cities such as London were not only loci of empire but trading hubs. At that time European nations exercised power at sea. However, there were other players on the high-seas — the pirates, portrayed as scavengers and thieves but also as social innovators and redistributive “Robin Hoods”. Continue reading

French street artist Invader recreates Joel Brodsky’s iconic Jim Morrison photo with Rubik’s Cubes

From Andy Baio’s post, Kind of Screwed.

Agency: Assembly (Showroom) :: April 13 - May 28, 2011 :: Opening: April 12; 6:30 - 8:30 pm :: The Showroom, 63 Penfold Street, London.

The work of Agency constitutes a growing list of ‘Things’ that resist easy categorisation, such as divisions between culture and nature, creations and facts, subjects and objects, humans and non-humans, individuals and collectives. These things are derived from judicial processes, lawsuits, cases, controversies and affairs relating to the subject of intellectual property (copyrights, patents and trade marks, for example). Continue reading

Certified Copy :: November 20, 2010 - April 10, 2011 :: Opening: November 20; 6:00 pm :: Verbeke Foundation, Westakker, B-9190 Kemzeke (Stekene), Belgium.

1989. The American Fluxus artist Larry Miller distributes certificates to allow anyone to decide on the use, or not, of their DNA. The action, which relates the art scene to contemporary biotechnological problems, would precede the birth of Dolly, the first cloned mammal in the world, by a decade.

In a world where numerous multinationals multiply data banks destined to the patented reproduction of genetic information, the Verbeke Foundation organises an exhibition on the notions of copying and cloning. Certified Copy unites the works of over twenty international contemporary artists who are concerned in the question of the reproduction of living and lifeless materials. Continue reading