Online image theft is one of greatest concerns for artists in this digital age. How do we protect our intellectual property once it’s uploaded onto the Internet? One solution is not to upload it at all — to not put your work out into cyberspace. Does this solve the problem of piracy? Yes. However, connecting through social media, websites and blogs is, for many of us, a fundamental part of our creative expression and how we do business. Prior to the World Wide Web, an individual, organization or publication had to find the artist in question and get usage permission because there was no other way. Even today, contacting the holder directly is still the best practice and easy to do. A message through Twitter, for example, or sending an email only takes a few minutes, with an answer usually forthcoming within a business day. But the temptations of our got-to-have-it-now culture … [Read more...] about Five Tips to Protect your Creative Work on the Internet

People collect everything! Really! Everything! Pokémon. Famous peoples’ autographs. Bars of soap from all over the world. Historical peoples’ hair. Toasters. Happy-Meal toys. Penises (honestly, a man in Iceland has a museum). Dalmation-spotted items. Coca-Cola cans (8,000 different cans). The collections included in the “Open House: A Portrait of Collecting” at the Lamont Gallery on the Phillips Exeter Academy campus are fascinating. Director-curator Lauren O’Neal said that over 10 private collections are part of this exhibition that includes hand-carved sculptures, antique radios, African artifacts, prints from the gallery’s archives, photos of “crowdspotting,” paint-by-number pieces and a site-specific installation that engages multiple senses. As a psychology undergrad, I must admit the psychological profile of collectors has always intrigued me. I, being more of a minimalist — … [Read more...] about Open House: A Portrait of Collecting

JULIA ZANES EMBRACES CONTRADICTIONS There is a magical realm of flora, fauna, celestial bodies and mystical beings at the Dianich Gallery in Brattleboro through January, brought to you by sorcerer and painter Julia Zanes, whose show, “The Blue Prophetic Alphabet,” consists of 52 (as in a deck of cards) paintings on plastered board mounted to screen printing frames. Do not think Picasso’s Blue Period or blue as in “the blues.” Zanes’ blue is light-emitting. She shared method: “If you use apure blue,” [my guess is its most often ultramarine here] “and surround it with more neutral colors, even though it is the darkest color in the visible spectrum, it glows.” She demonstrates this again and again in these remarkable paintings. There is to them almost an other-worldliness. The artist told me she’d like to think her paintings are “about language.” In some ways, though, they are … [Read more...] about The Blue Prophetic Alphabet

THE GUILD OF BOSTON ARTISTS' LEGACY CONTINUES The radioactive land cemetery that is Fukushima may have been overshadowed in recent years as news outlets have trained their lenses on other human and natural disasters, but in Japan, a country only 50 years removed from the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the fallout is psychological and physical — and ongoing. “More than three years have passed since the meltdown, and the ruined facility is still spilling radioactive waste into the ocean. A recent article in The Guardian appeared under the somber headline, ‘Fuku-shima Cleanup Progresses, but there is No Cause for Optimism,’” writes Wesleyan University professor Andrew Szegedy-Maszak in a compelling essay that will accompany “A Body in Fukushima,” a combined photography, video and performance art work that will make its debut on the Middletown campus in February. The … [Read more...] about A Body in Fukushima