Left: Richard Prince Right: Patrick Cariou
Larry Gagosian and Richard Prince are still in trouble about this “copyright infringement” business, normally I would be for Cariou, but the Gagosian camp makes a good point…
In his response, Prince, a renowned appropriation artist who frequently uses others’ imagery in his work, argued that the photographs in Yes Rasta are not “‘strikingly original’ or ‘distinctive’ in nature”, and that his “transformative” uses of the photographs were “done in good faith and reflect established artistic practices”. via…
Here is the other thing, the Prince work isn’t that good. It is immature and poorly executed. The composition of the piece is sound (also based in someone else’s work) but the details are sloppy. I guess in the end everyone wins. Cariou get’s publicity for his original photographs along with some new fans who will fight with him against these thieves. Prince gets some publicity for his art as opposed to his associations (LVMH, James Frey) for the first time in a while. And Larry…well, he’s just being Larry. We don’t need to worry about Larry.
