Art – Power to the people.
Andrew Dubber has an interesting discussion with the founder of Kompoz, a site that allows you to collaborate with other musicians online. Collaboration via the web has been going on for a while, but Kompoz is a dedicated site that make the process easy. There was some discussion about a musicians art being “precious” and the reluctance to give control to a person you’d never met.
This basically, was my reply.I’ve collaborated via the net with people I’ve never met, people were doing it before Kompoz, Kompoz has just streamlined the process. Think of the doors it opens to people geographically isolated. I find the idea very exciting because you’re not limited to your geographic area, your talent pool is the world. Imagine a composer like Beethoven, for his artwork to become real, he needed people to play it. 180 years after his death, he still needs someone to collaborate to make his work real. Without musicians, the 9th symphony is dots on a page. When I play in an orchestra, I become part of a work from an artist long dead, yet I share a connection. It’s such a powerful link to the past and and artists genius. When I go to a museum, I look at a painting, but it’s static. I feel a connection, and emotion sure, but the artists work is done. I can’t add anything to it. Yet when I play a Beethoven piece, I inject my own talent, feelings, and perceptions into it. It’s never the same twice, it’s dynamic and living. I think when print music lost its dominance to recorded music, that dynamic was lost. Recorded music is static, it’s the same every time you listen to it.
Technology has changed all that. Instead of being consumers, fans can now be participators.I think the days of preciousness with your art being a viable strategy are coming to an close. Modest Mouse is letting fans make a video for their second single. Bare Naked Ladies are releasing source tracks so fans can remix their songs. The days of Artist/Art Consumer are ending, as the line between the two becomes blurred. People who consume your art will Expect (with a capital “E”) to be involved in the process. The web and its related technologies have always been touted as a “power to the people” kind of revolution, but I think it is just now starting to realize its potential, and I find the whole thing amazing in its potential to change art as we know it.
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