Dayton Visual Arts Center (DVAC) Free For All Presentations

Thursday, 15 February 2007, Part 1: Computer Monitor Color Management (in Acrobat PDF)

Thursday, 8 March 2007, Part 2: Printer Color Management (in Acrobat PDF)

Tuesday, 18 March 2008: Photographing Your Artwork (in Acrobat PDF)

Click here for the latest free version of the Adobe Acrobat Reader.

 

Digital Art

In 2003, I started to experiment with Digital Art. The reasons are found in the brief description of “Making it Better,” while a more general description of the process is found through the following:

What is Digital Art?

Copyright

The economics of being an artist — in other words, how to avoid “starving” — has always been a challenge. The challenge is one reason that most artists, including me, create their work as a part-time endeavor. Added to the challenge is the very real issue of having one’s work copied and resold used without permission. Even though stealing or misusing an artist’s work is covered by copyright law, it occurs everyday. To make it more difficult to copy and reproduce my work — to steal it — all the images on this web site have an embedded copyright “watermark.”

The US Copyright Office now charges an artist $45 to register an individual work of art. If an artist produces ten works over the space of a year, that's $450 in registration fees — before the cost of trackable postage and packaging to survive the inspection of mail sent to Washington, DC. That is $450 not spent on paint, canvas, jury fees, or all the other expenses an artist incurs. Large publishing and media companies incur the same fees, by the way, but probably don’t have the same economic concerns felt by most artists.

Under current law, an artist's work is partially protected without being registered, but the artist must prove financial harm. Considering the fact that many artists make very little money from their work, the financial burden of protecting copyright are stacked against the artist of limited means — that is, most artists, for whom litigation against a large publishing company or media giant would be less like David versus Goliath than Ant versus Godzilla.

With recent Congressional efforts at a so-called Orphan Works law, this unbalanced situation holds the poetential to get even worse. Two bills before Congress, H.R. 5889: Orphan Works Act of 2008 and S. 2913: Shawn Bentley Orphan Works Act of 2008, appear to remove existing protections for artists who do not register their work. Potential infringers (who might they be? a clue: look for the employer of the Senate bill’s namesake, a very large media company) get even more advantage by simply demonstrating a bureaucratic effort to find the copyright owner through the US Copyright Office.

Fair?

As of August 1, 2008, neither bill is yet law, so voters can still contact their elected representative in the House and Senate.

The problem of copyright violation is vitally important to my artistic livelihood and to the entire visual arts community. There are a variety of options available to help artists protect their work, including registering (as I do) their work with the US Copyright Office.  Another mechanism is the Art Copyright Coalition (ACC), a 501 (c)(6) trade association whose goals are: 

• To protect the rights of artists, art publishers, copyright owners, their licensees and agents in the field of the arts,
• To educate the public on the issues of copyright law and the rights of copyright owners in the field of the arts,
• To develop standards of conduct related to respect for intellectual property in the art industry, and
• To help resolve copyright disputes between members in an amicable manner.

The ACC web site (http://artcc.org/) has educational material about the important topic of artistic copyright.

Links

When I was an art student, I received lots of encouragement to express my visual creativity. I read lots of books on techniques and I studied other artists. I did not, however, receive any practical guidance on how to make a living as an artist -- I learned the hard way what "starving artist" means. In the September 19, 2005 issue of Newsweek, art professor J.D. Jordon wrote a provocative essay for the My Turn section of the magazine, entitled, “I'm an Artist, But Not the Starving Kind.” With the subtitle, “We have as much training as other professionals. Imagine if we had their business sense, too,” the essay challenges artists to value their own work. The essay is recommended reading.

 The Dayton Visual Arts Center is a group of artists and art lovers who believe that a vital visuals arts community is essential to the life of the community. From gallery talks and exhibit openings to professional development workshops, DVAC provides opportunities to meet others who share an interest in art and to learn about and support contemporary visual art. Since 1991, DVAC has been the Miami Valley's leading proponent of contemporary art.

The National Association of Independent Artists is a group whose purpose is to enhance the economic well-being of artists who exhibit their work at high quality outdoor and indoor art and/or fine craft shows, encourage creative expression and artistic excellence, and expand public awareness, appreciation and acquisition of fine art and fine craft.

The National Association of Photoshop Professionals (NAPP) is the publisher of Photoshop User magazine and the best source I have found for learning how to use Adobe’s software. Membership costs $99 per year and includes 8 issues of the magazine, access to overe 700 online tutorials, free brushes and patterns, discounts on computer hardware/software, and many other benefits. If you decide to join, please mention that I referred you.

  The Ohio Arts Council is a state agency that funds and supports quality arts experiences to strengthen Ohio communities culturally, educationally and economically. The Ohio Arts Council was created in 1965 to “foster and encourage the development of the arts and assist the preservation of Ohio's cultural heritage.” The Council believes the arts should be shared by the people of Ohio. The arts arise from public, individual and organizational efforts. The OAC supports and encourages these efforts.

Selling artwork involves more than the creative process. Government wants its share of sale proceeds (in the form of taxes) and accurate accounting is the law; pity the artist who doesn't pay attention to these details! My favorite local accountants are Goldshot, Lamb, & Hobbs