Ballad of a Bootlegger
Director, producer and screenwriter Jim Jarmusch states:
Nothing is original.
Steal from anywhere that resonates with inspiration or fuels your imagination. Devour old films, new films, music, books, paintings, photographs, poems, dreams, random conversations, architecture, bridges, street signs, trees, clouds, bodies of water, light, and shadows. Select only things to steal from that speak directly to your soul. If you do this, your work (and theft) will be authentic. Authenticity is invaluable; originality is nonexistent. And don’t bother concealing your thievery- celebrate it if you feel like it.
There is a network of unspoken rules regarding the authorship and creative capital that makers hold. This question does not feel consensually understood in this field: where does my genius as an artist begin and end and where does the collective knowledge bleed into that?
These works are part of an ongoing investigation into anti-containment, authorship, and access in the contemporary craft field.
