The Future Of The Artist
The Future Of The Artist – Will It Go The Same Way As The Music Industry?
Alta Mira A Replica Of The Original Cave Painting
I just went to the Edinburgh Art Fair 2015, some of my work was exhibited on the Art In Healthcare exhibitor stand. I’ve been recently thinking about visual art and how it might go the way of the music industry, in the sense that people will be able to get copies of real artworks digitally and then fabricate them using maker technologies and even perhaps even in your local FabLab or Makerspace.
Do you disagree? You might think music is totally different to visual art. What is the future of the artist? Read on and check out the end of this blog post for a video to accompany this and also some great resource links.
I want to talk to you about the future for artists in this age of new and emerging technologies. I’ve got two things to talk about here, the first one relates to two dimensional art such as those I make in the form of paintings and drawings. The second relates to 3d work such as those of my own.
Art Piracy Is As Easy As 123D Catch!
2D Copying
If you have a decent digital camera, even an IPhone or tablet, you can take a photograph of a 2D artwork such as a painting in an art gallery or museum and then take it to something like Photoshop to adjust the perspective and colours.
perspective control using a 2D digital application
This can get ok results, if we look at artists who make giclee prints, they are often made from photos of the original taken in a careful setting and then printed to sell as limited editions. I think due to ever improving perspective control, colour adjustment and sharpness filters, people will easily be able to “pirate” their own famous artwork into good quality prints for themselves without the artist receiving royalties in the same way can happen with music downloads today. There are even technologies now emerging that will exactly copy a painting with all its paint strokes and flaws! Check out the end of this post for a video to accompany this post and also some great resource links.
3D Copying
Moving onto 3D work such as sculpture it’s only a matter of time that we will be able to quickly grab one of our favorites sculptures on our IPhones or other cameras and scan it into 3D and then replicate it using a 3D printer. High-end 3D prints such as those you can now order on Shapeways are available for printing with metal and other precious materials. Research centres, universities and companies continually improve 3D scans. Meanwhile, the graphics company Autodesk has a free application, 123D Catch where you can sometimes get good 3D scanning results just be taking photos with your phone in a circle around the model that you want to capture.
The Stanford Dragon
Again, I see in the next ten years that the artist’s original 3D real life creation will be able to be copied fairly accurately and easily.
Lessons From The Music Industry…
The Napster Logo As Street Art
If we look at what has happened in the music industry with users easily being able to find where to download music for free and the subsequent collapse of music artists earning directly from their music sales. If you were around in 1999, Napster emerged from the internet of that time and people could basically get songs for free.
This ended the golden age for signed musicians and now musicians from all genres have to offer more than just their music. They have to make the buyer feel that they are buying into a luxury, a style, a brand almost. This will make core fans actually buy the music, buy the vintage vinyl limited edition with cool artwork, buy the t-shirt and mug as well as enjoy the musician’s music!
Although art has not yet gone down the same route, I can only see this happening in the near future. So what can artists do to prepare for this possibility? If you go to a big art gallery, there are so many artists making art. However, there are not so many but some offering an experience value, a culture, a luxury and again a brand…
What Artists Can Do To Prepare…
This goes for both “low art” and “high art”, comics to fine art. In my view again, like musicians it is important to create an on-line and offline presence and create your own unique culture around your art that will keep your core fans buying from you.
The Coming Visual Art Apocalypse?
For example YouTube videos showing people what you’re doing or like I do, transferring knowledge to others from what I have learnt in my artistic journey. Regular social media feeds on Twitter, Facebook, Reddit and also perhaps most importantly and something we should all be doing is to get out in reality sketch on the street. I find this a great way to get people noticing you as an artist. I always try to be ready to hand out postcards to people who appreciate my work. You can also think about creating art not as a product in itself but part of your culture and a part of yourself and this is what your core fans will buy into.
What do you think?
Are you prepared for what I see as a new business model that will soon arrive as a hurricane and change the whole model of the art business or do you think this will not happen for a long time, if ever?
What You Can Do If You Create Things?
If you make art professionally or as a pastime, think of ways you work at this moment and how technology could help or hinder you and your artistic income in the future. If you make 2D art, what would you do if most of your fans just copied your work? If you make 3D sculpture works, again what would you do if people who wanted your art could just easily reproduce it. Where would your income from?
Would you ever consider giving some of your artwork away for free as a payoff to gain core fans who will follow you and spread the word about who you are?
My Views
Over the last 15 years, I’ve seen a massive progression with 3D graphics and also 2D graphics. When I graduated in 1999, it was the time of the internet. 3D graphics still blossomed but those riding the wave of the internet got the gold. Now, with the maker revolution, I think it is now the time for people like yourself who create things in reality to grasp this revolution and ride the wave. Although, this might mean dramatically changing the way you earn your bread and butter!
Today, I believe artists should not be content with just making their art. They need to add extra. After all, look at a lot of the famous artists of the twentieth century. Andy Warhol for example, like or dislike his art, he was a master of marketing and branding. This was a major reason as to why his work was catapulted into the stratosphere financially and his fame too. People wanted the “Warhol Brand”. We live in exciting times, time when we will be pushed outside out comfort zones. But that’s always a good thing, isn’t it? Check out this video I made to accompany this blog post…
Resources
Get One Of My Artworks For Free Digital Download
123D Catch A free and simple way to make 3D Scans
Article About How A 3D Printer Can Reproduce Paintings!
How Technology Has Transformed The Music Industry, Artist’s House Blog Entry with video interview with Bertis Downs, manager of REM
The Stanford 3D Scanning Repository
Sharing How I make My Art Installations on Instructables, I like to open up how I made my art to others
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