Archive:Fred Benenson with Creative Commons

Fred Benenson is an alumni of New York University, and a member of the Free Culture Board of Directors.

At NYU, we held a Creative Commons Art Show. The artists decided the price for their work, we sold the art, and kept no cut.

The first order of business is space to show the work. We had to reserve a place where we could keep the art up for a month.

The second order of business is finding artists. We asked our friends, put information out on email lists, and contacted local photobloggers.

The third order of business is explaining our goals. We talked about what CC is, what the distinctive licenses are, and encouraged them to convert. We used mostly open and free licenses. Most picked non-commercial.

Getting the art itself required specifiction of hangable frames, 20" * 30", and licenses for the art. The art show was open for one night with free food, and the art was kept up for a month preceding. We had an editorial/ explanation on the wall detailing what the art show was about, information about the artists, about CC, and about FC.

The goal of the art show was to promote Creative Commons in the real world. We had to do a lot of explaining as to what the licenses mean.

What can you do?

1) Hold your own CC Art Show. You can reuse, or remix, all the art from the first show - although it would be good to get more artists involved so they can be informed about CC. You can also hold an "Illegal" Art Show

We are also holding a Film Remix Contest. We got legal waivers saying that you had to use parody. They are trailers, which is better than film because you can just hit high points. Some way to expand this is have film professors assign it to their students, or make a webpage. You can use specific DJ's for music remixing.

Some well-known examples of this are the "Grey Videp", the "Grey Album", and Alternative Freedom. Also look at Recording Industry vs The People.