Perfect Disease, a video about the pathologization of homosexuality
Making a video from found footage was exciting for me because it combined two things I've always enjoyed - video editing and collage. I found the project to be more difficult than I thought it would be. Layers of video and music and sound clips easily gets to be too thick and overwhelming. However, it allowed me to explore ideas of appropriation, theft, and fair use. Taking video clips out of context and using them for my own concept, I was able to construct a whole different meaning out of something that already existed. Should I get credit for my own ideas? I think the answer is yes. Lawrence Lessig illustrates this point with a comparison to writing; he questions why it is okay to borrow quotes and ideas from other writers in essays and dissertations in order to illustrate an idea- yet the same rules do not apply to making art. When media are borrowed from culture without permission it is considered illegal. We live in an age where it is no longer realistic to always create truly original works - this is why we borrow from preexisting works and from culture. Negativland expresses these views in an article called "Fair Use", pointing out the flaws of these copyright rules and the idea of fair use (which they describe as "the only nod to the possible need for artistic freedom and free speech in the entire copyright law"). Given all the current flaws with copyright law and fair use, I find Negativland's proposal to be a good idea; they support the intent of copyright law, but would have "the protections and payments to artists and their administrators restricted to the straight-across usage of entire works by others, or for any for of usage at all by commercial advertisers."
