I have a discussion I want to start… It’s about original art and what it is. A friend had one of his designs of Kamela Harris stolen and is being sold by a website. The conundrum is this… He based the design on Shepard Fairy’s Obama “Hope” poster… who in turn used a photograph… who in turn used Obama’s image… My friend also used the phrase “A New Hope” which is a reference to Star Wars… (I don’t know if that was his intention) I don’t know where Shepard Fairy got the idea to manipulate it the way he did but he was not the first to process an image in the way he did. There were fierce legal battles between Shepard Fairy and the owners of the photographs copyright, which was not the photographer, as he was shooting for the Associated Press. My friend is engaged in another legal battle with the website selling his work… The list of people, images and sources for these works are long and tangled. Artists copy… it’s how we learn and if you define art narrowly, as a unique and original concept devoid of any other influence, nothing ever created would meet that criteria. So. what are your thoughts?