Homework 9

There have been exactly two "series" of video games that I've actually enjoyed in my life. One: I really, really like Guitar Hero. Two: Pokemon. Pokemon is life (I actually did dress as Misty for Halloween this year). I've played Pokemon games from many different generations, both on Gameboy Advanced and Nintendo DS. With these two gaming consoles being handheld, stellar graphics aren't generally an attainable goal for them. However, I think that the all video game graphics should be considered art. A successful video game has graphics that may not be ultra realistic, but they do succeed in putting the player into the respective video game reality.

Something that's important to realize is that the graphics of a video game aren't everything. There are some video games that users have given terrible ratings too, but that also have beautiful graphic design. So while a video game artist is responsible for making the game visually appealing to players, he or she is not held accountable for the overall quality of the video game. Take Star Wars Battlefront - many of the reviews on Amazon are negative, claiming that there is not enough game play for the game to be good. However, a good majority of these critics also give acknowledgement to the fact that the graphic design for the game is beautifully done. So, it's still a work of art.

Project 4

Homework 4

"Is Richard Prince a genius, or does Richard Prince suck?"
Richard Prince is a con man - "a man who cheats". The thing about con men, it that to get away with their scheming and their heists, they must be geniuses. But the difference between a con man and Albert Einstein is that Einstein used his genius for good (well, the Manhattan Project is a touchy subject...). In order to collect the photographs for his book Yes, Rasta, Cariou spent six years in Jamaica for the project. By January 2010, the total profit that Cariou had earned from his book was $8,000. Yes, that's a lot of money...but for six years? Not only that, but given that Prince earned $100,000 from appropriation of these images - the amount looks even more pale for comparison.

The way that I perceive this scenario is that Richard Prince let Cariou go out and do the dirty work - he was the one who spent endless time and money collecting the photographs - and then swooped in to exploit Cariou's labor for his own profit. In nature, this type of creature is called a parasite. If Prince had appropriated images for nonprofit purposes (like many students have done in this AVT class), it would be a different story. If my memory serves me correctly, "profit" is not one of the acceptable circumstances for fair use. Money is absolutely a matter here. Making a living as an artist is difficult, and Richard Prince essentially screwed over someone in the same boat. Given the immense profits that Prince was able to earn from his appropriation, he should have worked out some type of commission deal with Cariou.

In my own life, I've never been too concerned with issues of copyright. But that's because I haven't really created anything that's worth stealing. My field of interest (career-wise) is in writing, and that field is more difficult to "appropriate" in any way. Because of this, I predict that I'll have little trouble with copyright infringement in the future.

Homework 2

The numerous articles concerning GIFs discuss (and sometimes answer) several questions related to the file format. For me, the question that stands out as being the most interesting and heuristic is: Are GIFs art? I believe that the answer depends on three different factors - the intention of the creator, the use of the GIF, and the general interpretation of it by the audience. In class, we have discussed that responsibility in art falls not only on the artist to create, but also on the viewer to perceive; I believe that the matter of whether or not GIFs are art is also dependent on these two roles.

For example, take the GIF Super Mario Clouds, created by Cory Arcangel. According to the Artnet article, when Arcangel produced Super Mario Clouds, his work was significant to himself as a reminder of his days of hacking Nintendo games. If I were to see this GIF with no prior knowledge of it or its creator, I may have just thought to myself "huh, clouds. That looks nice." However, since I viewed this GIF accompanied by background information, I understand the intentions of the GIF and appreciate it as "art".  Others may appropriate this GIF, and give it their own personal meaning - but the fact that it was created with an express, artistic intention and is further used in other artistic circumstances means that this GIF is a piece of art - at least, in my opinion.

Another example of a GIF, one not taken from the articles is shown below:

In case you aren't familiar with this weird man making a weird face (if you aren't, I HIGHLY recommend that you go and watch The Office), this is a fictional character named Jim Halpert, who is known for often making memorable faces, such as this one. GIFs that are appropriated from TV shows, such as this one, are not art. While this GIF may be used by someone to convey his or her facial expression through social media (or something), they're not giving the GIF any new meaning, and in making the GIF they did not produce express artistic intent. So to me, GIFs that have been appropriated with no perceivable change are not art. However, as I said before, I believe that overall it's a matter of intention and perception.

Homework 8

The thing that immediately strikes me, concerning zines, is the lack of commercialism to them. This course is actually the first place I've heard anything of them, but I'm quite intrigued. One of my pastimes is blogging. I write for my own movie blog, as well as a rather large site based in the UK called ScreenRelish. The ScreenRelish gig doesn't pay anything, which is fine with me; because it's something I enjoy. However, the site still has advertisements, even though these ads turn up minimal profits for the editor. The idea that there's a type of magazine free from advertising, a magazine in which each page is 100% dedicated to the project, is heartwarming. Also, I like the fact that zines are almost like collectible comic books for people who aren't infatuated with superheroes.

One of my blog pages is called "Cinematic Wisdom", and it's a small growing collection of quotations from films that have either inspired me or just made me think. I think it would be cool to make an altered version of this page for the class zine. I'm going to use quotations that have been inspirational for me, and also include an image of the speaker with each quote.

Homework 7

Project 3