In a series of short films, director Kirby Ferguson has been gradually making the case that “Everything is a Remix” — that great art doesn’t come out of nowhere. Artists inevitably borrow from one another, drawing on past ideas and conventions, then turning these materials into something beautiful and new. The first film highlighted the role of remixing in literature and music. The second installment shifted the focus to filmmaking, while the third turned to technology, computers and user interfaces. Today, Ferguson released the fourth and final installment — “System Failure” — which makes the argument that ever-expanding copyright laws, despite what our Founding Fathers intended, now tilt in favor of corporate interests rather than the social good. And, more ominously, they threaten to put the brakes on an essential part of the creative process. If you’ve enjoyed this series, which you can watch in full above, you can support Ferguson’s next project, This is Not a Conspiracy Theory, on KickStarter.
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The song during the credits of Part 4 is the excellent Water From the Same Source by Rachel’s. http://youtu.be/djaWMNqDiTE
Unfortunately, Ferguson gets so carried away with his idea that he winds up rendering “remix” as so universal that there’s nothing, can BE nothing, that isn’t a remix. If he can find a progenitor of an idea, or a phrase, or even a single still from a film, he calls it a remix. On the other hand, if we look at this more metaphysically, we might recognize that we ourselves are remixes, and that’s more interesting to ponder.