In an intriguing article about remix culture, The Ecstasy of Influence (Harpers.org), author Jonathan Lethem practices what he preaches, that creativity requires a generous scope for borrowing, alluding, quoting, reusing, remixing, that these acts are fundamentally sane, wholesome, and critical to creation.
My husband is an artist and I am a lawyer. You might wonder whether we have a whole lot to talk about. Well, I guess it's fortunate that I'm a copyright lawyer. At least that has an obvious relationship to the art world. But more to the point, we're both in graduate school right now (I'm pursuing a degree in Information Studies, he's pursuing an MFA in studio art), reading incredible things and talking about how phenomena in the art world, such as the shifts that occurred in the 20th century, are mirrored in the development of communications technology, of law and information policy. We should have had this article in front of us this weekend. It's right to the point. Lethem's themes are universal and so very important to the worlds of innovation, wherever based.
The article is long, but well worth your time to read it.
