As an artist we all somehow want to protect our artwork once we put it out in the world, but in actual reality we definitely can't. We can do all these copyrights, trademarks, and whatnot to keep people from stealing their ideas. What some of us new upcoming artists don't understand is that our work is for the public. If you want to protect it you might as well make art in your own personal space and never let it reach the light of day. How do you think we are able to move from era to era of artwork? We study the previous era and try to do something different by modifying different techniques just a bit or extremely. SUPERFLEX's concept is in a way an explanation of my most recent piece "The World is my Gallery". I know that I want my work to be displayed for all the public to see. I dont want it to just be cramped up in the gallery for other artists and collectors to only see. I do upload some of my artwork on different social networking sites because that is one of my quickest ways of connecting to my true audience, everyone. I don't mind because I know that I am a bridge for other artists I may inspire to grow, as we all artists are. The sooner we realize that and stop trying to protect our pieces from people to get inspired by, the sooner we can start back up the era movements again.
SUPERFLEX is a trio of Danish artists who explore the boundaries of an original piece and a direct copy. The artists played around with the best-known brands and trademarks to create their own logo, which ran the risk of many legal problems. Some of their pieces that have caught a lot of heat are:
FREE BEER - An open source beer.
Black spot sneakers - Anti corporate sneaker power.
Guaraná Power - Soda trying to use global brands as raw material
Mecca Cola - The clash of colas.
Social Pudding - Copy pudding
All of these pieces frame the concept of SUPERFLEX's vision "to challenge intellectual property."
Their motto that I love so much is "If Value, Then Copy". I love artists who actually tests these types of boundaries that are so sketchy to touch on. I guess I just have a love for guerilla artists because those are the people who are actually making the art that inspires me so much. They are basically at the top of the pedestal of controversial art playing with people's emotions, making people interact with their pieces. I so upset I didn't get to see them speak when they came here to Tyler because I would of had so much to ask, talk about, and get inspiration from them. AHHHHH I'm just getting that "stuck for words" feeling that I love getting when talking about an artist. I could go on and on about SUPERLEX, but you have to have a taste for guerilla art to appreciate them like I do. Just go to their site http://superflex.net/.
Here's a video of one of their pieces that still has me in amazement. Oh and FYI this is a life-sized paper replica of McDonald's!!!
Flooded McDonald's from Superflex on Vimeo.
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