At the time it happens, you don't know the impact of an image. But today if you think about Jackie Kennedy, the Jackie 1964 print by Warhol might be the iconic image embedded in your brain. But it has remained in the realm of pop/fine art, controlled and managed and it is the creator Andy Warhol who became the star in the process of mining popular culture to make graphic icons and a fortune in the proces. When you see the photo of Jackie, you think: Warhol. How do we iterate ideas? How are they reiterated? Is the reiteration more important than the original?
Just as popular is the graphic image of Che Guevera by artist Jim Fitzpatrick, who has copyrighted his work under the caveat that it can be freely used as long as it promotes Che Guevera. The image as a one-color rendering has became a part of our culture, more famous than the personage Guevera.
In the first instance, Warhol's Jackie, Warhol is equally as famous, if not more so now, than the images he created. The opposite is the case with Fitzpatrick.
Fitzpatrick's graphic was taken from Alberto Kordo's 1960 photo of Guevera, which has been considered the symbol of the 20th century and one of the most famous photos ever (also released with a conditional copyright allowing the image to be freely used as long at it propogates the memory of Guevera). But now it is the reiteration of the photo that has become more culturally famous than the original photo, which was an iteration of the man. Does the third iteration express the idea of the man, or has it come to represent popular uprising, brave oppositional leadership, anti-establishment and the ideas that the man represented? The image is now a symbol.
Media and ideas and communication. A process of continuous iteration and interpretation. A Che-thing. Packaging our culture-as-it-is and as-it-changes.
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Yes, the image captures culture as it changes, but there is also quite a dynamic occurring with his caveat: to be freely used as long at it propagates the memory of Guevera. That in itself will continue to make in impact as it is used, interpreted... and of course, as even this loose copyright is infringed on.
Posted by: susiej | February 17, 2008 at 05:32 PM