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In Reply to: Hey Tamar! No such thing as a 'copy artist' posted by Oldtimer on December 24, 2003 at 14:52:20:
Here's a tip for using search engines like Google. If you're trying to match an exact phrase it's best to surround the phrase by double quotes ("). This gets you better results and avoids embarrassing circumstances such as posting to a forum stating that there is no such thing as a "copy artist".
There are, in fact, numerous references on the Internet to "copy artist". That said, it soon becomes obvious that what a copy artist does and what Tamar has done are so distinct that Tamar cannot rightfully claim to fall under the category of "copy artist".
A copy artist is someone who, as a hobby or career, replicates pieces of art for which the copyrights have gone public (or the artist has been dead for more than 70 years). In any case, the copy artist will replicate--with as much detail as possible--the entire piece of art, never just a segment of it. A copy artist may not piece together portions of several artists’ work to create a new piece of art, as Tamar has done--especially not if the art being copied is still copyrighted.
The subject of using reference material for artwork is another justification Tamar has used to hide behind. True, most artists will use reference material, but never will the reference be a copyrighted piece of art or a photograph for which model rights have not been released. In many cases, an artist will use a book filled with sketches of body parts in various configurations. Picture, if you will, a page with 50 or so sketches of a right hand in several poses from a number of different angles. This is the type of reference material a professional artist uses.
In Tamar's case, she is a tracer, not an artist (those of you who have seen the movie "Chasing Amy" will appreciate the humor in this). The fact that she has signed her name to many of her compositions clearly states that she intended for the creation of the art to be accredited to her. If that is not plagiarism and copyright infringement, I do not know what is.
