Week 4 - Artist - Molly Soda & Girl Talk

Today's contemporary artists often try to mix unusual forms that have not been attempted in the past to continue their artistic experiments. Each artist's typical methodologies are casually recombined according to specific prerequisites. Or even in individual works, many artists connect heterogeneous concepts and elements unrelated to each other in a single format. It is also possible to create a new artistic space-time uniquely with this connection. The critical keyword is 'mashup' (remix), derived from popular music.

If you look at the creation process of modern artists in the 21st century, you can find some work methods that are different from those of the past. The features that musicians try are becoming a model for new collaboration methods for creators in other fields. Originally, featured meant the participation of a famous musician in recording a relatively less renowned newcomer. However, as hip-hop culture developed, it became increasingly difficult to know who was featuring whom. The featuring track serves as an excellent example of a cultural hybrid where both musicians' brand styles are revealed. Some artists have borrowed the conventions of featuring and are trying to collaborate on a different level from previous works, that is, by emphasizing each other's characteristic representative stylistic strategies.

Girl Talk

The character of the work environment of this era, which is also broader, is in the final work. The digital work environment has made possible things that were not possible before. Many artists took original sources from other people's music in the post-production process and edited them to create various final forms of work. The most characteristic experimental method is Greg Gills' Mashup, also known as DJ Girl Talk. An engineer-turned-musician, he took hook-up lines from other artist sources. After importing, he created a remix that clearly showed the Parting Line, building an unprecedented meta sound. It is not an exaggeration to say that this caused a boom of remixes in the popular culture of the 20th century.

I don't think these actions of Greg Gills are illegal. I don't think it will be a problem if you write exactly where the source came from in the title and content as you work. At the same time, I believe that the income generated from the remixed music should be equally distributed with the original musician. I think a remix is ​​an excellent opportunity for both the actual musician and the remix arranger. Because people are curious about these two works, so they will find and listen to both the original song and the remixed song. At the same time, I think it is one of the marketing techniques.

Molly Soda

She is a digital artist and social media celebrity based in New York, USA. Molly Soda has gained many subscribers by sharing her Webcam performances through her online platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram, outside of her existing offline exhibition space. As in her work, her Phone Zone, she mainly revealed the individual's daily life in a private area such as a room and bed and the individual's vulnerability displayed in the media. In addition, she uses the aesthetics of social media to present the current state of today's social media cultural phenomenon, covering topics such as multi-persona, online narcissism, contemporary feminist culture, and perversions.

When I saw her works, the old-fashioned Webcam came to mind. When I saw her work, good work came out because it harmonized the retro and modern sensibility well. Stimulating old emotions that are difficult to find today is an excellent way to elicit empathy for many people.

I think these two artists are similar in remixing existing works in their way. The only difference is that Greg Gills took other people's sources in the field of music and reinterpreted them in his way. On the other hand, Molly Soda used her Retro sensibility in the early 2000s to create her works in her way. I don't think these two artists can be considered the same way Picasso and Mozart work. Picasso and Mozart created something from nothing, and Greg Gills and Molly Soda reinterpreted something from something. However, all artists can be inspired by the work of other artists. I think this is an exciting area because the work created by the Remix can be interpreted uniquely in a different way from the original work.