If a Picture’s Worth a Thousand Words, How About a Picture of a Picture? When It Comes to Making Copies, Photographer Tom Powel Is the Real Thing

NEW YORK—Marilyn Minter takes pictures. Then she paints pictures of the pictures she has taken. When she’s finished, she hires Tom Powel to take pictures of her pictures of her pictures.

His pictures go into books and catalogs to catch the eye of buyers willing to pay $100,000 or more for a painting by Ms. Minter. For his pictures of her pictures, Mr. Powel earns $2,000 a day.

“I don’t know how Tom does it, but he’s the best I’ve seen,” Ms. Minter said in her SoHo loft one day. “If you took a sloppy picture of one of my pictures, it’d look like…a photograph.”

She was leaning over a table, brush in hand, varnishing her latest creation: “Sludge,” a painting of a Photoshopped photo of a glossy shoe overlaid with dribbles of translucent goop.

“Dog hair,” said Ms. Minter, picking something off the surface. Then she straightened up and said, “I’m done.”

Her painting glared in the track lights. Standing to one side, Mr. Powel said quietly, “Varnish. My nemesis.”

His job now was to kill the glare and capture the gloss.

Mr. Powel, 54 years old, began doing this kind of work in 1985. Digital cameras and computer software have since become tools of manipulation, but Mr. Powel seeks absolute fidelity.

He resists the urge to make his pictures look better than the pictures he takes pictures of. He’s a star in an occupation that stands out for self-effacement.

The occupation doesn’t exactly have a name. “Copy photographer” works well enough, or maybe “archivist.” Photojournalist Mustafah Abdulaziz, who came along for this newspaper to photograph Mr. Powel taking pictures of Ms. Minter’s picture, said, “I didn’t know this was a job.”
While news photographers have lost business to Flickr’s amateur crowd, photographers of pictures are in big demand.

Collectors today often don’t get to stand in front of an artwork before they buy it, especially if they live in China. They see a picture of the artwork first—and it had better be a good one.

“A lot of our clients experience pictures only through the illustrations in our catalogs,” says Conor Jordan, who runs the Impressionist auctions at Christie’s in New York. For him, pictures of pictures are “of pivotal importance in the art market.”

There barely was an art market, in fact, until engravings of paintings appeared 500 years ago.

Black-and-white photographs followed, then color transparencies—each technique inching toward a truer facsimile of the real thing.

Mary Beth Peil and Michael Laurence in Willy Holtzman’s play “The Morini Strad,”
Music performed by Hanah Stuart.

I recently had the opportunity to see “The Morini Strad” about legendary violinist Erica Morini and the story of her stolen Stradivarius while hospitalized at the end of her life.
I loved it… the story of a passionate prodigy who played what many consider the greatest achievement in musical instrument making (the Stradivarius)… the mystery surrounding the stolen Stradivarius (which to this day still has not been solved) and how easily greatness can be forgotten.
The Strad serves as a reminder of a time when Erica was hailed as the next great female violinist. “When one is young,” she says, “one hears only the word ‘great.’ When one is less young, one hears only the word ‘next.’ ”
Arturo Toscanini bestowed a silk scarf on Erica and Leonard Bernstein stopped by for dinner… Erica hardly left her Fifth Avenue apartment in the last decade or so and she died a forgotten genius.
It is a sad story that reminds us all that achieving greatness is not how we are remembered, it is how we treated others.

UK-based 18-year-old student Florence Colgate has the most naturally perfect face, according to British lifestyle and entertainment show ‘Lorraine’.

According to The Daily Mail, a woman’s face is said to be most attractive when the distance between her pupils is just under half of the distance between her ears. Colgate scored a 44% ratio.

The distance between a woman’s eyes and mouth should be just over one-third the measurement of her hairline to chin. Colgate scored a 32.8% ratio.

“Florence has all the classic signs of beauty,” Carmen Lefèvre, of The Perception Lab at the University of St Andrews’ School of Psychology, told The Daily Mail. “She has large eyes, high cheekbones, full lips and a fair complexion. Symmetry appears to be a very important cue to attractiveness.”

“Although we don’t realize it in everyday interactions, in most people’s faces the right and left half are actually quite different.”

The blue-eyed blonde—who’s currently studying ‘A’-levels at the Dover Grammar School, and works part-time at a seaside chip shop in Deal, Kent—has never had any plastic surgery or chemical enhancements, and normally wears only light foundation, mascara, concealer.

For the natural beauty contest ‘Lorraine: Naked’ (where no make-up or cosmetic enhancements of any kind were allowed), Colgate won a trip to a London model agency and will be featured on billboards and posters in beauty and health retailer Superdrug stores.

Colgate told The Daily Mail that she would love to have a career in modelling but “is currently studying business, geography and psychology, and intends to do business management at university.”

“Women should not have to feel that they have to wear makeup,” Colgate said. “I hope people will look at me and think they don’t need to. I’m very happy with the way I look and I would never have any plastic surgery or Botox.”

Can science define beauty, in your opinion?

You never know what people are hiding. When Dan Oppenheimer opened the door to Jack Robinson’s apartment, for example, he had no idea what he’d discover. He knew that Robinson had been a photographer in an earlier chapter of his life that he rarely spoke of.

Oppenheimer, who had been Robinson’s boss at a stained-glass studio in Memphis, recalls that Robinson kept mostly to himself and had very few friends. Few people even knew he had died, which might explain why Oppenheimer found himself in this position to begin with: There was no one else to take care of the effects.

What Oppenheimer did find when he opened the doors was an immaculately tidy apartment with exactly one of everything: One plate, one bowl, one mug. Robinson only wore white shirts and jeans, Oppenheimer says, and his spare white buttons were meticulously organized by size. A few cameras were in a display case. Then he opened the closet.

“I opened this one box, and stacked down to the bottom was Elton John, Joni Mitchell, Jack Nicholson, The Who,” Oppenheimer says on the phone. “It became very obvious that this was no ordinary photographer.”

Jack Robinson, it turned out, had been a commercial photographer in New York City — namely for Vogue — long enough to build an archive of some 150,000 prints of the most recognizable faces of the ’50s, ’60s and ’70s.

It wasn’t until after his death that Oppenheimer discovered this — and more. Like the fact that Robinson was gay; that he had skyrocketed from a small-town Mississippi home to the upper crust of social hipdom, carousing with Andy Warhol’s milieu; that he’d had a serious alcohol problem, which, likely in tandem with other factors, led to his ultimate unraveling.

Ever since Robinson’s 1997 death, Oppenheimer has been piecing together the photographer’s life — cataloging and publicizing the photos, managing what is now the Jack Robinson Archive. And after more than a decade, a preview of Robinson’s work can be seen in the book Jack Robinson On Show: Portraits 1958-72.

The introduction gives more context. Robinson was convinced by an art dealer to leave the bohemia of New Orleans, where he had moved for college, to pursue a photography career in New York. After some time, he got a foot in the door of Vogue, where “his skill as a portraitist attracted many renowned sitters,” the introduction reads. It continues:

Most of his shots are direct, unfussy, and very rarely furnished with props, the exceptions often being instruments — Elton John’s Piano, Joni Mitchell’s guitar. There is an explorative sensitivity in his work, which could be a consequence of his sexuality. … Warren Beatty, then the most celebrated of Hollywood womanizers, becomes in black leathers a gay icon, and when revealed donning his neckwear, a narcissistic fop.

The career lasted 17 years before Robinson came undone and moved to Memphis. There, he sobered up and took a job as a stained-glass designer. By the time Oppenheimer met him, New York City and photography and alcoholism had all been buried in the past. And there’s really no one who knows much more — at least not outspokenly.

“I kept waiting for some family member to step forward and make arrangements, and to this day no one has stepped forward,” Oppenheimer says on the phone from Memphis. Robinson, it seems, left everything to Oppenheimer on purpose — knowing it would be in good hands. He was right; Oppenheimer still gets excited when he talks about it.

“I wouldn’t have known what Tom Wolfe looked like 45 years ago but I knew the name,” Oppenheimer says. “It overwhelms people to this day to see all of the icons of your youth … to see all of these people when they’re 20 years old.”

And he’s just scratching the surface. In that tiny, unassuming Memphis apartment lived an Alexandria. Today, the people who sat for Robinson, of those still living, are aging. But the photos, pristine as ever, preserve their famous, fresh faces as if no time has passed.

by CLAIRE O’NEILL – NPR

I had the opportunity to dine at Marcus Samuelsson acclaimed eatery Red Rooster on Saturday.
The atmosphere was alive and festive and I could see why Michelle Obama eats there when she comes to town.
The location is easy to get to, right off 125th st and Lennox ave in Harlem (around the corner from the Apollo Theater)… I love this historical part of Manhattan rich with influential music and dance of all kinds.

Food was great… my son had the fried chicken (so delicious), my friend had the swedish meatballs and I had the winner with a 3″ thick pork lion chop that was perfect in every way. Highly recommended.

The recently finished downstairs is a sexy speakeasy style environment complete with the amazing drinks that our trendy “cocktail culture” world craves these days. It has a great throwback feel as there are no windows much like The Raines Law Room and PDT”s. These underground cocktail bars leave us with a feeling of escapism… to an era where things were much simpler… all about imbibing with great people.

A case in which photographer Richard Reinsdorf files a federal lawsuit against Skechers to the tune of 250 millon dollars seems to be flying under radar as it crawls through the courts. A reader alerted me to it months ago and I recently went back to see whats developed.

The suit started when Reinsdorf discovered that images he took for Skechers from 2006-2009 and licensed to them for very specific terms–six months use in North America for point of sale, magazines and certain outdoor advertisements–were being used for several years and included in ads overseas and on packaging and other unauthorized media. The suit states that Skechers “completely and utterly ignored the terms of the license.” (source)

First reported by TMZ back in September of 2009 it took an unusual turn in 2010 when Skechers filed a motion to dismiss claiming ownership of copyright because of “alterations they performed on the images from slight modifications in models’ skin tone to the substitution of models’ body parts and the addition of substantial graphic effects.” They asked the judge to dismiss because they couldn’t possibly have infringed on their own copyright.

If you want to read the motion to dismiss you can download it (here). It certainly would set a disturbing precedent in the photography world if something like this were to be allowed. In the discussion the judge states that “Skechers is correct that a co-author in a joint work cannot be liable to another co-owner for infringement of the copyright” but that’s not what’s at issue here because “Contrary to Skechers’ assertions, the evidence in the record does not indisputably establish that Reinsdorf intended that his photographsbe incorporated into a joint work.” He simply gave them a limited license to their use. The motion to dismiss was denied.

The latest I could find was an order granting Reinsdorf an extended discovery cutoff of May 15, 2012 (here). This will certainly be a case worth watching. I’ll be interested to see what the judge thinks of the $250,000,000 price tag, the limited license terms and Skechers sketchy defense that advertisements are a joint work and can be used where ever and how ever they want.

by A PHOTO EDITOR on APRIL 4, 2012

©Michael D. Jones. The photographer says this portrait of Quincy Jones, shot in 1995, was recently used without permission in ads for audio headphones and other applications.

A co-defendant in the copyright infringement case against celebrity music producer Quincy Jones has denied the infringement claims, which were filed in February by Los Angeles photographer Michael D. Jones.

Harman International, which allegedly used a portrait of Quincy Jones without the photographer’s permission to promote a line of its audio headphones, says that Michael Jones shot the portrait under work-for-hire terms. Therefore, the photographer doesn’t own the copyright to the images and can’t claim infringement, Harman says. (The company has yet to produce evidence of a work-for-hire agreement, however.)

Harman adds that even if Michael Jones does own the copyrights to the image, he transferred those rights to Harman. As evidence of that, Harman points to a rights transfer contract drafted by its attorneys, but Michael Jones’ signature is conspicuously absent from that contract. For good measure, Harman says its use of the portrait was “fair use,” so Michael Jones’s permission wasn’t required.

“Any and all uses that it made of any such photographic images were authorized, lawful and not infringing of any alleged rights,” Harman asserts repeatedly.

Harman says it is responding to the claims only for itself, not Quincy Jones or the other defendants, including music publisher Hal Leonard Corporation, which also used the portrait.

But Harman’s response presages those of the other defendants, and the dispute is likely to boil down to two questions: whether Michael Jones photographed Quincy Jones under a work-for-hire arrangement, and if not, whether Michael Jones subsequently transferred usage rights to the defendants.

Michael Jones says he shot the images in 1995 during several sessions at Qwest Records. He provided Quincy Jones with some 8×10 prints, but alleges he was not paid for shooting the last two studio sessions because he refused at the time to sign over his rights to the images.

Years later, in 2010, a Qwest Records executive allegedly offered Michael Jones $5,000 for what amounted to a copyright transfer of one of the images so Harman could use it to promote a line of audio headphones endorsed by Quincy Jones. The photographer says he demanded $10,000 for a license, and that he subsequently refused a counter-offer of $6,500. Allegedly without any license agreement, Harman ended up using the images anyway.

A court date has not been set.

by Shane Ferro
Three hours into last night’s New York Law School double panel on appropriation art in the digital age, Sergio Sarmiento, an artist and lawyer who serves as the associate director for Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts in New York City, said the one thing that no one else had thought to bring up after endless circling through the pros and cons of current copyright law: Why do we care so much?

Sarmiento’s contrarian position (and short-winded speech) was a breath of fresh air in the windowless room. For some reason, the question of copyright, while an arguably minor part of the U.S. legal system, gets people excited. This is perhaps because copyright exposes a tension between some of this country’s most prized values — it pits personal liberty against private property within the context of the one thing that Americans care about most deeply, our entertainment (or, in the art world more specifically, our livelihood). The nexus of the three was enough to get people yelling around 7pm in a drab corner of Tribeca.

The “Right to Remix: Appropriation Art in the Digital Age” was actually two different panels — the first discussed more broadly the ways in which artists come up against copyright law, and the second mostly focused on the disputed Prince v. Cariou appropriation art case currently winding its way through the courts. To be somewhat reductive about it, they both tackled the tension between the right to freedom (to share) vs. the right to property (to control sharing). But at the end of the day, what we learned is that the one thing that is really important to both sides is money. What follows are the key points that I took away from the presentation:

1) THE 21ST CENTURY IS A REMIX CULTURE

In the first panel, there were good arguments to be had on either side. On the one hand, Paul Miller (aka DJ Spooky) pointed out that we live in a remix culture, and copyright law is still working on a 19th- and 20th-century (that is to say, analog) model, which doesn’t work for the digital age. “Remix is about found memories,” he said. We share things to splice old memories together to make new ones, and artists should have the freedom to do that as long as they are making something new. However, Miller also admitted that he runs his finished work past his lawyer, and has never been sued.

2) THE FOUNDING FATHERS WERE NOT PRINCE FANS

On the other side, intellectual property lawyer Britton Payne, who is an associate at Foley & Lardner LLP and an adjunct professor of IP law at Fordham Law, pointed out to me after the panel that copyright, at its heart, is a reflection of the American obsession with property and is written into the Constitution (Article I, Section 8). It has existed since at least 1789 — though its roots go further back than that, and it’s not a portion of U.S. law that is just going to fade away. Americans profess to love freedom, but we really love property.

3) MONEY — WITHOUT IT THERE’S NO PROBLEM

Of course, if you are going to post some random copyrighted image of your favorite band on your personal blog that only your aunt and your grandmother read, the record company that owns the image is probably not going to come after you. Copyright claims are generally confined to those places where wealth is concentrated — on both sides. You (probably) won’t get sued unless you are making money off of your creation, and you are unlikely to sue unless you can afford a lawyer. “The way you stop people from doing things is by having money,” said Payne.

4) WHEN IS APPROPRIATION UNFAIR USE?

That, it turns out, was the perfect segue into the second panel, which discussed more specifically the Prince v. Cariou copyright case. Appropriation artist Richard Prince was sued by photographer Patrick Cariou after the former took images from the latter without permission for the now infamous “Canal Zone” series of works shown at Gagosian Gallery in New York. After a judge found in favor of Prince, Cariou appealed and got the ruling overturned on the basis that Prince’s use of Cariou’s copyrighted works was not considered “fair use.”

Daniel Brooks, Cariou’s lawyer, was present last night to make his case, albeit one that was unpopular with the three panelists who followed him. He noted that there is “no reason that art galleries shouldn’t be held to the same standard as book publishers” in making sure that a work is vetted for copyright infringement before being displayed, and also added that there is insurance available to guard against these sorts of things. In the end, he insinuated that photographers would be put onto a lower rung in an art world “caste system” if they could not sue to protect their work from being appropriated.

5) SHOULD MORE SUCCESS MEAN LESS FREEDOM?

When it comes to artists, people are used to cheering for the underdog. Former Whitney Museum director and current art practice department chair at the School of Visual Arts pointed out that Prince “is being treated unfairly because he is successful.” Indeed, many of the arguments that Brooks made hinged on the fact that Gagosian has the money to do things like hire lawyers to vet appropriation artwork, and buy insurance against possible copyright lawsuits.

But Gago is a particular case and is not representative of the art world — or even Chelsea — as a whole. Most galleries do not have the funds to fight off lawsuits while putting on another appropriation art show in the Hamptons, as Gagosian did last summer. Other galleries, instead, will shun appropriation art, to the dismay of the art world (called a “chilling effect”). It’s the future precedent that the art professionals on the panel seemed worried about, not the particular facts of this case (they are, unfortunately, on the opposite side of the law on that one).

6) WHAT IS VS. WHAT SHOULD BE

The last word — before an extraordinarily bungled attempt to distinguish appropriation art from plagiarism that I don’t care to expound upon — came once again from Sarmiento. He took a step back, as one of the three people on the panel who serves as a teacher of artists in some capacity or another, and asked the question — whether or not we believe the current copyright law is wrong, “when you are teaching artists, what are your ethical obligations?” Shouldn’t you teach them what the law is and how to follow it, rather than what you would like it to be?

After the panel was over, I ran into Karen Sandler, the executive director of the free software organization known as the GNOME Foundation. She expressed disappointment that so many people on the panels advocated appropriation, sharing, and free culture while taking us through presentations on their DRM-equipped Apple products that generally prohibit sharing. But digital rights/restrictions management and the art world is a different conversation for a different day

French photographers organization Union des Photographes Professionnels (UPP) launched a controversial new advertising campaign this week, speaking out against the use of photographs without proper permission and/or payment. The ad reads: “Each day, a photographer’s work is used without his consent”. A spokesperson for UPP states,

It’s obvious that professional photographers are not being listened to. So, for the first time, we’re speaking to the photographic community with an image. We hope to raise awareness among the public, as well as the media and the government, about photographers’ problems. Each day, photographers are faced with decreasing rates. They are forced to compete against image libraries that are offering vile prices. These practices are infringing on photographers’ moral rights.

In a blog post, the organization adds, “Each day, photographers risk their lives to allow us to stay informed. And each day, photographers continue to be dealt with as if they weren’t producing anything. [...] With this image, we want to show the violent and disrespectful economic reality that photographers have to deal with.”