Friday 11 October 2013

Collaboration (spread the love!) by Angel Young

Where is the line between collaboration and protecting your own work? It's certainly a thing I've been pondering lately.

Italian Street Artist Collaborating with the Highways Department!

Recently I attended a real time class with someone I greatly admired, an artist who's work really has such a great vibe - you know the ones I mean, where something universal runs through their art, regardless of the medium, and you can feel the purity of the universe has been combined into that piece or poem or dance, whatever! 

But the course was a bit of a let down because the artist was reluctant to share those techniques, worried we would copy and undo the considerable body of study they had undertaken.

I can understand the concern, but it seemed to me that was a profound misunderstanding of most artists' intentions. We all are trying to tune into our muse, and let the universe flow through us, and because each of us is unique, the creation is by necessity, altered. What I am trying to create is very different, even though I'd hoped some of the techniques would prove useful. After all we all "stand on the shoulders of giants" and spark off each others' creations.

I'm wary of claiming ownership in this way in my work, I see that I am channeling that universal vibe, which combines the current moment, and all those moments which have lead to that one. It's the nature of the creative act. And I expect those that follow will do the same. Rather than feeling ownership I feel honoured to have inspired others. Imitation opens the door to a revised version that speaks to another generation. To be creative is to be at the cutting edge of life. So for me, share your work and share the love. Don't be fearful, and trust in your version of the vibe. See what comes after as your collaboration with the future, and the atoms that made your work exciting will be reinvented a thousand times into the future. And that is the gift of collaboration, knowingly or otherwise. Let's share the love! It makes the world a better place.

Angel Young is resting in Venice this week, amongst a thousand layers of history and collaboration.

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