Art vs. Print vs. Plagiarism
Mar. 20th, 2008 08:03 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
wynddancerI'm currently reading the post and comments on plagiarism here: http://icarusancalion.livejournal.com/741394.html?format=light I can't help wondering about the comparison between art and a master study and printed works and plagiarism. I think when a student copies a work of art as a master work in painting and no calls it plagiarism it's because the copy isn't diluting the original's value either artistically or monetarily. A piece of finite, i.e. there can only be that one piece of art in existence.
Take Starry Night for example. There is only one SN in existence that was created by the original artist and that is all that there can ever be of that item by the original artist. However, people can and do buy reproductions of the print knowing that they are reproductions. It's not possible to dilute the market of the original painting, i.e. there's only one of them. Art is a limited supply.
Original art is limited while reproductions of it may not be if those reproductions actually exist for the artwork in question. I think most people know (unless they are delusional or art thieves) when they purchase the SN for themselves that they are buying a reproduction and not the original. People accept that they are buying the plagiarized or copied version of the work. It's built into the industry. I also think it's harder to actually plagiarize art than writing and requires more work, money, and talent than most people are willing to put into it (passing off a painting you did yourself as a reproduction as the original painting in question).
However, in printed works I think it's different. When you buy a book you buy the original copy. Alright, you can say you're buying reproductions of the original copy owned by the publisher. However, printed works are mass market; they are not a limited supply, unless they are in the rare book category (few in number, etc.). Rare books exist--because they are considered to be original.
It's possible today for there to be millions of original books in circulation. Millions of copies of just one book. Especially with today's technology, it's easy to pirate or reproduce the book and even claim it for your own (plagiarism). This does dilute the original work to certain extent. Why buy it for full price when you can get for cheaper or for free? Why pay the author at all? Why shouldn't it be free?
If someone buys the book with the plagiarist's name on it not knowing any better, then that customer thinks that the plagiarist wrote the work in question instead of the original author and won't know what name to look under for more work by that author. Heck, if that person comes across the original work with the original author name it that person might even think that the original author is the plagiarist!
I think part of the reason why it's considered to be plagiarism instead of copying for practice in printed works is because it's so easy to do (search and replace; add a few words here, a few words there, etc.). Why does the person feel a need to copy someone's printed work? To learn about technique as painters do? I think that's fine to do as long the copier keep it to themselves, i.e. don't put it online and say it's yours--it isn't. You just retyped it. People don't always know who the original author is--i.e. even famous authors use pseudonyms to publish in different genres (Stephen King and Richard Bach for example). Even publishers don't always catch a plagiarist in time before they publish the plagiarized work.
I also think it's because printed works are "harder" to remember. When I think of the SN, I get a visual and I know who painted it. When I think of the Belgariad series of books, I remember vague details--sorcerers (male and female--Polgara, Belagarth, etc.), big destiny, gods involved. I really don't remember much in the ways of details. I think the first book started off at an inn. It's easy to get "confused" or forgetful with printed works.
Anyway, that's just my 2 cents and then some.
Take Starry Night for example. There is only one SN in existence that was created by the original artist and that is all that there can ever be of that item by the original artist. However, people can and do buy reproductions of the print knowing that they are reproductions. It's not possible to dilute the market of the original painting, i.e. there's only one of them. Art is a limited supply.
Original art is limited while reproductions of it may not be if those reproductions actually exist for the artwork in question. I think most people know (unless they are delusional or art thieves) when they purchase the SN for themselves that they are buying a reproduction and not the original. People accept that they are buying the plagiarized or copied version of the work. It's built into the industry. I also think it's harder to actually plagiarize art than writing and requires more work, money, and talent than most people are willing to put into it (passing off a painting you did yourself as a reproduction as the original painting in question).
However, in printed works I think it's different. When you buy a book you buy the original copy. Alright, you can say you're buying reproductions of the original copy owned by the publisher. However, printed works are mass market; they are not a limited supply, unless they are in the rare book category (few in number, etc.). Rare books exist--because they are considered to be original.
It's possible today for there to be millions of original books in circulation. Millions of copies of just one book. Especially with today's technology, it's easy to pirate or reproduce the book and even claim it for your own (plagiarism). This does dilute the original work to certain extent. Why buy it for full price when you can get for cheaper or for free? Why pay the author at all? Why shouldn't it be free?
If someone buys the book with the plagiarist's name on it not knowing any better, then that customer thinks that the plagiarist wrote the work in question instead of the original author and won't know what name to look under for more work by that author. Heck, if that person comes across the original work with the original author name it that person might even think that the original author is the plagiarist!
I think part of the reason why it's considered to be plagiarism instead of copying for practice in printed works is because it's so easy to do (search and replace; add a few words here, a few words there, etc.). Why does the person feel a need to copy someone's printed work? To learn about technique as painters do? I think that's fine to do as long the copier keep it to themselves, i.e. don't put it online and say it's yours--it isn't. You just retyped it. People don't always know who the original author is--i.e. even famous authors use pseudonyms to publish in different genres (Stephen King and Richard Bach for example). Even publishers don't always catch a plagiarist in time before they publish the plagiarized work.
I also think it's because printed works are "harder" to remember. When I think of the SN, I get a visual and I know who painted it. When I think of the Belgariad series of books, I remember vague details--sorcerers (male and female--Polgara, Belagarth, etc.), big destiny, gods involved. I really don't remember much in the ways of details. I think the first book started off at an inn. It's easy to get "confused" or forgetful with printed works.
Anyway, that's just my 2 cents and then some.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-03-21 02:32 am (UTC)Some interesting ideas here. I think you've hit on something with the fact that when we speak of, hmm, *most* types of art, there is an "original copy" that we place a value on, and everything else is "just copies". Sometimes people *do* try to pass off forgeries of various types as the original, with varying degrees of success. But you're right that if I buy a poster of Starry Night, I know that I am paying $30 for not-the-original.
Meanwhile, with the written word, there isn't the same concept of "the original copy" -- it's all copies, that's the point.
But there are also ways that your examples break down. Take an animated film, for example. There's no "unique copy" of that, akin to the oil-painting-on-canvas that is the original Starry Night. The film is still an artwork. It'll be shown in theatres, and I can buy a DVD of it. The fact that there is no "unique original" that has an astronomical value in comparison to the small price I can pay for a copy doesn't mean that it isn't an artwork. And the point is, I could still attempt to defraud it.
Similarly -- yes, it would be technically difficult for me to reproduce an oil painting of Starry Night (with all of its pigments and textures) that I could attempt to pass off as the original. It'd be a lot less technically difficult (in this day and age) for me to plagiarize the photographs of Ansel Adams or Mapelthorpe, though.
That's why I was saying in one of my earlier replies in that thread that I have a feeling that the KEY component to the definition of "plagiarism" isn't the copying, because when you look at a lot of examples in both art and writing, you can find all kinds of cases where copying is fine, and nobody minds. The key part is the *fraud*. It's not making the copy -- it's trying to claim that you are the originator of the work/ideas.
(In some cases, making the copy is a violation of something else -- copyright. But while all plagiarism violations are copyright violations, not all copyright violations are plagiarism.)
I also think it's because printed works are "harder" to remember. When I think of the SN, I get a visual and I know who painted it. When I think of the Belgariad series of books, I remember vague details--sorcerers (male and female--Polgara, Belagarth, etc.), big destiny, gods involved. I really don't remember much in the ways of details. I think the first book started off at an inn. It's easy to get "confused" or forgetful with printed works.
:) Well, and also -- if your memory were just a bit more vague, you might say to yourself, "oh, series of fantasy books, sorcerers, big destiny, heroic boy accompanied by a band of helpers..." -- and the question would be, Belgariad? Or Shannara? ;-) The issue there, however, isn't so much the question of whether the Belgariad plagiarizes the ideas of Shannara, or whether Shannara plagiarizes the ideas of LOTR, but whether they're all drawing on a communal well of ideas. (Though, to be frank, I think of the Shannara books as rip-offs of LOTR; Belgariad, less so, although it's still derivative of the "fellowship quest" genre.)