Art for Art's Sake!

By day, I am mostly a law student. But when I get stifled by all the books and all the cases, I usually take out my camera and click my worries away. I do get paying jobs occasionally, but often, I find myself enjoying my little "art projects" more.

Let me explain about the art projects. I usually have photography shoot concepts rattling around in my head. I have little notebooks where put all these ideas. I'm not a stellar writer, so this is my way of telling a story. I draw inspirations from many things: magazine lay-outs that I see, songs, poetry, MTVs and many many more.

These art projects are NOT paid work. I have no intention of making of these or offering them to a stock photography site. I take pictures because I need a way to bleed all these stories from out of me. I need a physical manifestation of my ideas. In fact, I get more enjoyment from the art projects because of the fact that they are not a source of income. I love them because they simply ARE. It is enough for me to make them and to inspire others the way I am inspired by other works of art that I see.

Several weeks ago, I posted the work above in my deviantART account. It is entitled, "Goddess of A Thousand Suns." DeviantART has this interesting option where you can pick a Creative Commons License for your work. I selected an attribution/non-commercial license and allowed derivative works of my photo. A fellow member of deviantART soon messaged me and asked for permission to write a poem based on my photo. I allowed this and was very pleased with his results. It honestly flattered me, that someone would actually be able to draw inspiration from my own work.

IPL reduces intellectual property to monetary rights over the work. It forgets the old expression, "Art for art's sake." It also seems to assume that works are created in a vacuum free from outside interference. In reality, we are often inspired by other works and ideas are rarely completely original. This perhaps is the reason why I prefer using a Creative Commons License. It acknowledges that art MAY be for art's sake. It recognizes that ideas are often inspired by other ideas.

-Maria Frances Marfil (aka Keisie)