Two Art Movies
I just came across two art documentaries that could be very interesting. The first one is called Versions by Oliver Laric and the other is a followup to Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry, entitled, The Fake Case by Andreas Johnsen.
Versions is actually a part of the Black Box exhibit at the Hirshhorn Museum through October 5, which also has sculpture associated in the Sculpture Garden.
As Michael O’Sullivan describes in his Washington Post article, Illustrating imitation’s inventiveness, it explores what happens when an artist appropriates the imagery of another’s artwork. Artists use visual references all the time. This is interesting to me in that not only does it delve into the creative process but it questions the limits of intellectual property rights. One example that I had never noticed before was how Mogli’s stance and sequence of actions in The Jungle Book is a near exact replica of Christopher Robin in The Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, except Christopher is fully clothed.
I personally don’t have a problem with the above illustration because it is the same studio using it’s own visual reference. I wouldn’t even have a problem with another artist using one of these illustrations as a visual reference for creating new artwork, as long as it wasn’t and exact copy and they weren’t trying to claim it as their own. From a technical standpoint, visual references help artist’s produce their work with efficiency.
The second art film, The Fake Case, deals with the subject of a recent blog post about Ai Weiwei, his artwork and about the time when he was held captive in his native Chinese homeland. This film follows up on the artist after his 81 day detention in prison and his time under ‘house arrest.’ The film takes its name from Weiwei’s company called Fake. It could be a sleeper or an interesting rental.
We’ve been watching a lot of interesting documentaries lately, with our son Jackson’s guidance. He’s the film buff, so we’ll add this to the list but will probably watch after he returns home from his school semester this fall, since this film is out in theaters now. As I was writing this, he saw it was about Ai Weiwei and knew all about him and the first movie. He said that fortunately he has many helpers helping make his artwork for him in other places. Now, that should be another documentary.
casart
I'm an artist, wife and mother of two boys. I started my illustration business, The Occasional Palette over 35 years ago, when my oldest son was an infant. Once my children were in school, I began painting decorative, faux finishes and murals through my second business, Casart, now over 30 years old. My third business, Casart Coverings, is a springboard from my second. Click on the link on the sidebar to see innovative, custom, designer wallcovering, removable and reusable wallpaper and coordinating decor.
