Artist shortcut #1 Copying great artists

Leonardo's Leda & The Swan vs Raphael's St Catherine of Alexandria ... Great artists (Raphael) 'steal' (from Leonardo)
Images taken from http://www.Wikipedia.org for educational purposes.

No matter what kind of artist you are, it’s often tempting to take shortcuts. On the outset, they may save time, but in the long run they can prove costly in more ways than one. The first ‘shortcut’ I’ll be discussing in this series is ‘taking inspiration from other artists’.

There's an old saying that good/bad artist's copy, but great artists steal (attributed to Picasso). Do a search on www.google.com, and you will see dozens of articles about the fine line between being inspired and plagiarising (i.e. copying/ stealing/ ripping someone else’s work and claiming it as your own). But while plagiarism is BAD, being inspired by other artworks can help you become a better artist.

So when does a shortcut such as being inspired by other artist’s work become plagiarism, or even just cross the line and become ethically or morally bad? How do you use this shortcut to your benefit? Here are some personal thoughts on the matter:

1. Good artists copy.
We learn through imitation. Copying great artworks or even our favourite artworks can help us improve as artists. When we analyse other artist’s work, we’re learning many different skills about composition, colour, and technique. By looking at a variety of sources, even artwork we don’t like but know are popular, we’re increasing our understanding of what makes us react to art, and therefore can incorporate it into our own.

One word of caution, don’t copy artworks to learn anatomy. Artists make mistakes, often exaggerate or stylise anatomy, and get it wrong all the time! Even photographs distort anatomy. Learn anatomy from anatomy books, life drawing, and from photographs when you understand what you are drawing. I can not stress this enough!

2. Great artists steal
- There are reasons why you are drawn to particular paintings. Great artists take elements of what they see and recreate them in a way that is unique, riveting and original. If someone can look at your artwork and instantly pick out another painting that look remarkably similar to yours, then you haven’t been inspired enough (unless your work is a parody). It’s not enough to do the equivalent of a cut and paste… you need to make it your own work. Something that defines the piece as representative of ‘you’ or ‘your style’.

3. Acknowledge your inspiration/s:
It’s simple, it’s easy, and it’s ethical. The old masters would say ‘Painting X after Artist Z’. You’re effectively tipping your hat to your source of inspiration. If you’re concerned about copyright, contact the artist, or simply don’t make the artwork available for retail. Keep it as training exercise. You shouldn't be able to see a direct correlation between your work and the inspirational piece.

It always surprises me when I see works of art that have obviously been 'inspired' by another artist's work, yet the artist in question doesn't see fit to mention the source of their muse. I'm not talking about people who try out a 'style' or paint the same kinds of subject matter, I'm talking about artists that take shortcuts and directly 'borrow' a recognisable pose (say from Vallejo), an entire scene, or the whole costume (unless it's a historical or fan art piece). Sometimes it can be an oversight, simply forgetting what triggered the idea in the first place, but other times it shows a lack in judgement*.

* I'll be talking about the Good Decision Making Model in coming weeks.

Some ways to trigger inspiration by copying elements of other artist’s work:

1. Create your own reference file.
Gather anything that strikes your fancy such as photos, artworks, advertisements, books, jpegs, web pages, DVD’s and objects. Use this to flip through whenever you need a boost in creativity. I used to keep an art journal* for this purpose... now I have folders of stock images, websites bookmarked, and a filing cabinet filled with cut out images from all over the place.

*Look out for a future article on personalising art journals!

2. Use the image search on www.Google.com to spark off ideas. For example, say I wanted to do a painting with a medieval theme. I go to www.google.com and type in something like ‘medieval France’, or ‘Templar knights’. The results that come back may be maps or photos of re-enactors, or medieval stained glass windows, or architectural layouts of a castle. These then can trigger ideas, and inspire me through the use of colours in medieval manuscript, or the composition of a Leonardo da Vinci painting.

3. Try and recreate a famous painting using a different context. i.e. Take Medieval icon and recreate it as a science fiction scene.

Above all, have fun, be creative, but also be respectful of other artists' creative property.