Slashdot Mirror
Artwork Re-Sells Itself Weekly On eBay
Lanxon writes "How much would you pay for a piece of artwork that you could only own for a week? A Tool to Deceive and Slaughter, 2009, is a black acrylic box that places itself for sale on eBay every seven days thanks to an embedded Internet connection, which, according to the artist's conditions of sale, must be live at all times. Disconnections are only allowed during transport, says the creator, Caleb Larsen. Larsen tells Wired UK: 'Inside the black box is a micro controller and an Ethernet adapter that contacts a script running on [a] server [every] 10 minutes. The server script checks to see if the box currently has an active auction, and if it doesn't, it creates a new auction for the work.'" Another condition of sale is that the artist gets 15% each time the piece is sold. Maybe the First Sale Doctrine works differently in the UK.
So.. each person who buys this will, in theory, try to do everything they can to make sure that the sale price tops their purchase price (including shipping) by 15%, so as to recoup all their costs. Sounds like a great scam for the artist.
If you can only own it for a week, then why the hell would you buy it in the first place?!
Our culture doesn't get smarter, it just finds new ways of being retarded.
Only if the definition of art encompasses EVERYTHING. I like art too much to consider this an example. This is attention-mongering and marketing.
First sale doctorine doesn't apply if you have a contract. If you signed a contract to buy the piece of art, it certainly can have restrictions on what you can do with it. The first sale doctorine rather applies to limitations imposed by copyright, ie: the right for the copyright holder of something to sue you, even though you don't have a contract, because you sold it again.
according to the article '....give Larsen 15 percent of any increase in value ...', which is slightly different to what the story summary implies. I wonder, should the value decrease, does the seller get 15% back of any decrease?...I guess not!
TFA says that the artist gets 15% of the INCREASE in value, not 15% of the entire value.
The purchaser also gains the right to claim the title of "The worlds most obvious sucker".... ...but only for one week.
Space game using normal deck of cards: http://BattleCards.org
He doesn't claim you don't have a right of first sale to the raw object, he's just saying that if you don't adhere to the contract then the object loses its value as a work of art and will no longer recognize it as his legitimate work of art. So while you have whatever rights the law gives you to the raw materials, but he is controlling the use of the concept which is what anyone who would buy this thing is actually interested in.
A bit twisty, but if you're into that sort of thing it could work for you. I think every week is a bit much, makes it potentially not worth the effort to deal with it. I'd think at least quarterly would be the way to go.
Some famous artist once exhibited a metal cube about 1m on a side. He was based in New York, and one day, driving through New Jersey, he saw a sign that said "You design it, we fabricate it". So he called them and ordered a 1m cube of solid steel. It was explained to him how much this would weigh. So he settled for a cube of sheet metal on a frame. The cube was duly fabricated and drop-shipped to the Museum of Modern Art in New York.
That was in the 1970s, when it was at least an original idea. As late as the 1990s, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art was showing a Plexiglas cube held together with tape. That was embarrassing. (When SFMOMA started, all the money went into their building, and the permanent collection was awful. It's since improved, but it's still far behind NY and LA.)
As Frank Lloyd Wright pointed out, you can have very simple geometric forms, but the materials and finishes must be very well chosen.
...the art of making something (money) from nothing (black piece of plastic with a couple microchips built-in). Also could be considered the art of the pyramid scheme. Then again, the only people who would buy this probably have too much money anyhow, so at least it goes some distance towards the redistribution of wealth.
That's uh, all I really had to say
That's exactly what it is. Foolish fun. You should try it some time, it lightens up the day.
Not everything in life is about calculating that "you need to sell it at 118% profit to break even".
I assume the box contains one? Has he opened up his source already because this would certainly qualify as commercial use. Think I'm gonna steal this idea though and implement in the black boxes of airplanes. At least they will an excuse when they kind find it next time a plane crashes. Anyway, I anyone wants to bid on this auction, please contact me first. I am willing to rip you off for half the price. (Excluding taxes)
Yeah, whatever you say, Agent Smith.
That's exactly what it is. Foolish fun. You should try it some time, it lightens up the day.
Not everything in life is about calculating that "you need to sell it at 118% profit to break even".
Looking at the terms of the sale, I'd say that only counts as "fun" if you're a lawyer.
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law
If your idea of "fun" is spending thousands of dollars on a useless box and hoping that you'll make your money back in a few weeks ... E-MAIL ME!!! I've got old shoe-boxes that are begging for a loving home.
You buy it to participate in a cultural phenomenon and interesting concept.
If it were about £20 then I might join in. Hey, that might still happen as the novelty wears off. Just watching the price alone could be an interesting social experiment.
All intents and purposes. Not intensive purposes.
I thought you read TFA? "they must first pay any fees to eBay and give Larsen 15 percent of any increase in value of the artwork"
Hence:
- If you sell at the same price (increase in value of 0), you only lose the amount of ebay's fees
- you only have to sell at the original price + 118% of ebay's fees to break even
To everyone saying "scam" and "this will never work" and "this is not art": this auction and event is clearly not for you. I think it is for all those people who played and enjoyed "pass-the-parcel" as a childhood game. In this case, it is like playing pass-the-parcel in reverse. Remember, everyone who "buys" the work still has the right to "sell" it afterwards and this can go on until the value of the art drops. The person still holding the parcel in that situation is unlucky as s/he will lose money. So long as the artist stays in vogue or becomes more established, people will make (small amounts of) money on each transaction - up to a point. It's just a piece of harmless fun for those people who can afford to risk up to £2500 on a scheme like this. I agree with those who say that the artist should have gone for a monthly or quarterly rather than a weekly scheme. But I wouldn't think that their aim is any more than illustrating a principle.
Reality is defined by the maddest person in the room
Wow. The current bid sits at US $4,250.00 with six unique bidders.
Somehow, based on the posts here, I don't think that number is going to increase as a result of exposure on Slashdot.
My highschool art teacher had a special scowl when he told us about the commonly heard phrase among the plebes, "I may not know anything about art, but I know what I like." I tended to think that this is one of the more sensible statements I'd ever heard, but then I didn't get stellar grades in art class. I wonder if he'd be up for a black cube of doom?
From the FAQ. . .
Hm. That's actually kind of neat. I can see the appeal for the art community. Nice jorb. --Though, for the rest of us, the same feeling can be achieved at discount simply by contemplating the EULA on a piece of software. You own the disk, but do you OWN the disk? The mind reels!
Now THAT's art!
-FL
"Maybe the First Sale Doctrine works differently in the UK."
Or maybe it doesn't exist, what with that being an American law, and all, and the UK being a different country and all.
Why do Americans, and Slashdotters in particular, assume that the world's legal systems are based on the USA's?
With you being such a new country, you'd think you'd realise that your laws are an amalgam of what's gone before - and that Common Law or other branches were around a long time before your country existed.
The whole world doesn't want to be American you know.
Please define art.
I knew this story wouldn't go well on this site. Nerds typically don't get art. I don't get it either but am at least aware that the "art" in this case is NOT the physical black box but the entire concept. The concept of the black box (as a device that functions without you knowing what goes on inside) and the concept of it selling itself and needing to be resold.
A lot of art AIN'T about the physical product, but about the idea behind it.
Since I am a geek, I don't pretend to fully understand the artists thinking behind it and am even willing to admit that I personally think he might be blowing a bit of smoke. But the failing is mine, not his.
It is an interesting idea, but you got to be able to look beyond the mechanics. I predict that only a handful of real /.ers (as in people who don't think XP is the first and best OS ever) can truly get art. Forever outsiders looking in.
Then again, we get tech, which I notice some more socially aware just don't get... if only we could use both halfs of our minds at the same time :P
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Where do you draw the line? Simple example: Picasso. Mainstream or not? Once he was not, now he is. Rap was once extreme, now it is so mundane white people do it. Elvis Presley once shocked the world, now he is elevator music.
Movies were once extreme, daring, shocking and made in Hollywood, now Hollywood stands for everyday commercial crap.
When someone made the first shadow portrait, he or she was the first, pushing technology to new limits. Now it is old hat.
The paintings and photographs you mentioned all developed over time (get it, photographs, developed?) into different forms. The super realistic paintings that are considered "not proper art" anymore by the snobs but the rest of us buy (Rembrandt) were NEW once.
The media wants to show us new things. The first guy to break the 1 minute on the 10 mile run is news, the second isn't. The first moon-landing was news, by the time of Apollo 13, people famously didn't care anymore.
For art to be news worthy, it got to do something new. You wouldn't accept a slashdot story on a guy painting the ceiling of a church in high detail with just paint and brushes would you? Been done.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
I took a look at some of his other 'art' on his website.
One of his pieces of 'art' is a dollar bill acceptor on a plain white wall. Once $10,000 dollars is reached, the money is split between Larsen and whoever owns the acceptor. Then it starts again.
Another piece of 'art' was the purchaser of the 'art' assuming Larsen's credit card bills.
Another was a 'donor plaque', in which the more you gave, the bigger your name was on the plaque.
All of his newest pieces of 'art' just seem to be money makers for himself that prey on people who want to seem like they are hip to the 'art scene.'
I don't like Linux. This doesn't make me a troll.
Whatever scam you can get away with.
--Andy Warhol
Art or not, the physical device is owned by whoever last purchased it. The device then lists itself using the artist's credentials. Caleb Larson is then offering for sale an item that he does not own, have physical possession of, or title to (title passed to the last Collector). Strikes me that, beyond the sale to the first "Collector", this is a flagrantly fraudulent auction and that no contract can abrogate the law. I wonder how long before someone that parted with a substantial sum to possess the physical item (it is a nice looking cube after all) decides to challenge this through eBay.
On the other hand, it does point out some of the ludicrous goings-on with respect to trailing commissions in all sorts of fields.
Patent litigation: A doctrine of Mutually Assured Destruction... in which everyone seems willing to push the button