Scripps College
Presented at the Town Meeting on Fair Use of Digital Images as part of the presentation of Predicaments, The Great Hall, Cooper Union School of the Arts, New York, February 16, 1997
© Nancy Macko
Of my numerous CAA hats, it's a treat to be able to speak out on these issues as an artist. This gives me the opportunity to discuss the issues conceptually and in a nuts and bolts way as well. I have focused my remarks to provide information about the artist's relationships in working with digital images and picture rights with a greater emphasis on the use of digital imagery and draw them from comments by many artist members of the CEI (CAA's Committee on Electronic Information) and from my artist colleagues working digitally. I trust you will consider my remarks in the spirit of our mutual endeavor. If they seem radical it is because they are meant to loosen up our visioning.
Over the past two years, the artists' voice has been somewhat eclipsed by discussions which seemed to focus more on museum rights and the use of digital images in relation to copyright on the Internet, so it is difficult to locate an appropriate point of entry to the discussion. It may even seem to some of you that my comments appear outdated because the CONFU process has progressed beyond them by now, but this is the point. We --nor our interests, needs and concerns-- have not been a direct part of the discussion and in many ways are not addressed or reflected by the guidelines. In fact, it is my understanding that there were no teachers or artists in the CONFU working group.
What is a position statement on behalf of artists meant to contribute? I will attempt to clarify the artist's position from both the perspective of artists in terms of artistic production, which differs in many ways from traditional modes of scholarship; and in terms of teaching, where the role as educator in studio art differs significantly from academic courses.
Artists probably want more freedom of access to and expression with images than anyone else and, at the same time, equal protection of their images. A position that seems to contradict itself. To quote Cynthia Rubin, a digital artist who teaches computer imaging at the University of Vermont, "As an artist, I do not want any one downloading my work," yet "what I really want is a policy that encourages people to put everything that they have up on the web."
But this apparent contradiction really lies at the heart of both artistic production and teaching and it is perhaps something we (artists, teachers, museums, publishers) all have in common. We want free access with some protection for the images themselves. Although this does not address ownership of the images and rights of the image holders perhaps the following can.
„THE ARTIST = THE MUSEUM In many ways the artist maintains responsibilities and duties to his/her own work that is similar to a museum. S/he owns the original work, owns the reproductions of that work and in most cases, provides a repository to store the work. These are similar responsibilities to that of the museum which owns pieces of artists' work and provides the care and protection of them.
„REPRODUCTIONS When an artist is asked to submit slides to curators for consideration in a show, or to a writer for inclusion in an article, or to a colleague for inclusion in a slide lecture, or to contribute to a slide libraries' collection, no charges are ever garnered because each of these venues is non-profit. If an image is going to be used in a book (or movie, video, etc.) that might be sold and therefore make a profit, then some form of remuneration should be collected for the use of the image; but only in the case of a commercial enterprise that actually realizes a profit.
This should be the case for the museums as well. It is not fair to charge exorbitant rates for reproductions of images for non-profit usage. A small fee perhaps to cover costs of reproducing slides, but anything over and above that is exploitation.
„"ORIGINAL" DIGITAL IMAGERY "an image may have been produced entirely on the computer and not be a digitization of any "original" image. If a work is created on the computer, then the term "original" is ambiguous. If there are 10 copies of the digital file, they are identical. How is "original" defined for digital images? This is a basic point. . . . So far it seems that [the guidelines] apply only to the study of art, not its production." (Anne Morgan Spalter, Brown University)
„DOWNLOADING Guidelines similar to those listed above under reproductions should be respected when using an digital image for profit or non-commercial use. Artists using the Web to show their work or to share a website want others to see it, otherwise they wouldn't put them up in the first place; but they do not want anyone else to take credit for their work or to alter it and then take credit. This relies upon the respect of the user for the work but downloading for viewing, teaching and sharing should occur without cost.
„APPROPRIATION "As an artist, I am relying on my own photos, but in the past I have 'appropriated', and I do see how someone can legitimately consider this a part of the process, in terms of commenting or quoting the culture. It's like ASCAP going after all of those campers, wanting royalties for kids singing "happy birthday" around the campfire. It's being driven by an attitude that everything is private property to be metered, and there is no shared cultural fabric. It's also becoming not uncommon to be prevented from taking pictures in the street (of performance or a particular building) because of copyright violation..." (Annette Weintraub, CUNY New York)
„COPYRIGHT The idea of copyright on the Web seems to be up to the ethics of the user and the wisdom of the artist. I can put a copyright statement below my imagery but that doesn't guarantee that everyone will respect it, although this does seem to be the case so far. Personally I do not find it useful to download the imagery of other artists to use in my own work. In teaching it is a different matter. I have allowed my students go all out in downloading and altering images with the caveat to explicitly describe the nature of any changes they make and to display the original image.
When artists teach in the studio setting quite often the class would be better compared to a laboratory than an academic setting where one takes notes in a lecture situation. Additionally seminar-style discussion will occur as well as short lectures, slide lectures, critiques, guest lecturers and student presentations, which also often use slides. The need for color reproductions is as critical for the studio as it is for art history yet we have with different goals and outcome. We are each looking for clear, accurate color reproductions of images of artistic works that we can reliably use in our teaching.
Up until recently we have been dependent on slides; but now that many classrooms have networked computers with Internet access, we can begin to call up images on the computer more quickly and efficiently to use immediately in our studio situations. What does studio art require from a guideline for digital images and/or picture rights and how can our needs contribute to the creation of these guidelines?
A studio art professor introduces several contemporary texts about feminist critical theory to her students in a beginning computer art class. After several weeks of analysis and debate over the significance of the emergence of the bourgeoisie in the 19th C and the correlative experiences of hegemony, sexism, classism, racism and homophobia, the students are asked to go to the library to research images of artwork --primarily paintings-- that they find offensive based on the material they have been discussing. After discussion of why these images might now be seen as "offensive," they are scanned into the computer. The students are then asked to "alter" these works using computer software so that they are no longer "offending." A final critique of the altered works includes discussing the rationale for the changes and their significance. Both the original and the transformed work are stored in an archived file and printed out as slides to use in subsequent classes.
This same scenario could be applied to doing a search on the Internet accessing slide banks or museum sites for selecting the image with which the student will work. It also brings up issues of: reproduction as the image would have to be downloaded; alteration of the "original" image in relationship to the assignment; viewing at a higher resolution and size than a thumbnail so the "alteration" could occur accurately; and downloading to store the image in another computer while the file was being used. I believe that this project, taking place in an educational environment, should be seen as one of "fair use."
We want to be able to create larger images for better study purposes especially if it is meant to replace using projected slides as well as to create higher resolution versions for detail study.
We need centralized slide depositories that everyone in education can access to via the Internet. This would cut down considerably on duplication of effort and increase consistency of image quality at the same time.
The museums should put their collections on-line so we can use them in our teaching. Yet "we would need a searchable database that could be programmed to present the work we want to present in the order we want to present it." (Jerrold Maddox, Penn State University)
Max Anderson, Director of the Art Gallery of Ontario, has written extensively on the concept of site licensing for this type of scenario. For more information check on their website.
Museums and libraries should put up their own sites, and then link to each other as well as to existing sites. "All that we need is to HAVE the images SOMEWHERE on the WEB, and each person can make an index page of links. I am in favor of any agreement that gets this done, because then the rest is irrelevant. As the quality of the WEB grows, you will never need to worry about "downloading" and reproducing again." (Cynthia Rubin)
[The following comments have been culled from a paper entitled "A View of the Intersection of Art and Technology" written for The Art Bulletin series, "A Range of Critical Perspectives: Digital Imagery and The Practices of Art and Art History,"which will be published in the June 1997 issue.]
Who sets industry standards: .gov? .com? .org? .edu? .net? I have a real fear that in the not too distant future the Internet will become one big infomercial to watch on your TV screen like an eternal home-shopping network. Artists are concerned that their needs and uses of the Internet will be entirely ignored in this process, especially if they do not represent some sort of commercial enterprise. It is critical that there be a place at the Internet table for the artist.
Although new software and hardware become available on a regular, almost annual basis, this does not mean they are affordable. When it comes to making their work using computer technology, artists are still controlled by outside economic forces. The example below of "trickle-down" access is only one of the many factors that actually create limits rather than freedom. Software and hardware development is a megamillion-dollar industry geared to attracting the general public. Artists are not working in the research and development departments of industry or government, and their vision and input is not part of the process that invents the original. We are not at the helm of authoring the new products, nor do we have access to them until much later.
Contemporary art has long played a critical role in meaning making, relying not only on the intellect but also on personal meaning, the senses, imagination, and physical interaction to communicate ideas and form valuable cultural connections. The Internet, via the World Wide Web, has provided artists with global access to culture and visual information beyond anyone's past expectations or predications. What we do with that is critical if we are to make sense of our world.
And how art historians present contemporary digital work is also critical to this enterprise. How will art historians represent the images and the other phenomena created by the technical revolution in the arts and in the art world? Merely presenting digital slide shows, or even interactive slide presentations, barely scratches the surface of what is really occurring, which is truly revolutionary. As my colleague in the Department of Architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Professor of Art History Leila Kinney, pointed out to me in an e-mail last August:
There is an overall social significance to creating a situation in which artists feel comfortable making their work widely available for teaching and commentary. Art history has been notoriously poor at dealing with contemporary art, partly, I believe, because the visual material is hard to track down, and most slide curators would rather pick up the Saskia catalogue than call dealers or write to artists themselves. This impoverishes the critical discourse and hampers our ability to comment on contemporary culture. It would be wonderful to see artists, museums, and educators collaborate in changing this situation.
How will contemporary artists' work on the Web be represented by art historians teaching contemporary art and art criticism? What pedagogy will they employ to discuss these changes? What changes can occur in art history to include aspects and theories about digital technology? It's a multi-media world --at home, at school, and on the Internet.
How we choose interact with the media will shape and determine its value and role in the future.
[Associate professor of Art, Nancy Macko is secretary of the board of directors of CAA and chair of the Committee for Electronic Information. She is presently at work on a new installation entitled Re:Envisioning the Melissae, that will include Telling the Bees , a computer-assisted video (Art Department, Scripps College, Claremont, Calif. 91711, nmacko@scrippscol.edu)].