Mashup, Imitation and Creativity

I recently watched a "Ted Talk" by Larry Lessig entitled "How Creativity is Being Strangled by Law." I found him message relevant to my professional situation where I am constantly being confronted by questions of the "right and wrong" uses of online content.

Larry discusses the concept of Mashup as it relates to online content. In short, it is practice of taking a piece of existing content and using it as part of something new. This practice has been around for as long as we have been creating. Beethoven would use a musical theme from another composer as a basis of a new piece. Andy Warhol's image of the Campbell's Soup Can could be seen as an example of image mashup. Scratch DJs use vinyl recordings to create new music - Grandmaster Flash. I believe this artistic practice is widespread today because of the digital format of our content. Digital content lends itself to the art of mashup because it is infinitely editable. What a creative opportunity!

Young artists can use mashup as a easy entry point into the creative process. Rather than having to look for the creative inspiration in a blank canvas they can use an existing piece of content as a starting point in the creation of something and unique. This concept relates closely to my view on the role of imitation in the development of new artists. On March, 2007 I posted a talking-head video about my general thoughts on creativity. In particular, I talk about the role of imitation in the creative process. Check it out...



What is the role of mashup in today's new artists? Are we seeing mashup as the modern version of Beethoven using another composer's thematic material? hmmm

Andrew