View From the Phlipside Radio - Dylan Controversy

My name is Jay Phillippi and I've spent my life in and around the media.  TV, radio, the movies and more.  I love them, and I hate them and I always have an opinion.  Call this the View from the Phlipside.

Once upon a time Bob Dylan made the news because he chose to move from acoustic guitar to electric.  At the time it was seen as a terrible betrayal of his roots in folk music.  As the years went on people got over it.  Well little Bobby Zimmerman is in the news again but I’m not so sure what the final judgement of history will be of this particular problem.

Last month a rare show of Dylan’s paintings went up in the Gogosian Gallery in New York City.  The work was described as being a “visual journal” of the 70 year old music legends travels in Asia and as "first-hand depictions of people, street scenes, architecture and landscape".  Needless to say there was a great deal of excitement about the show.  Within days however people were looking at the paintings and thinking that some of them seemed terribly familiar.

In fact it appears that a half dozen or so of the paintings aren’t first hand depictions by Dylan at all.  They appear to be very close copies of well known photographs including the works of such photographic giants as Cartier-Bresson.  One photo copied was the cover of Life magazine.

Now let’s be clear about what the problem is here.  It’s NOT that Dylan painted from photographs.  Many artists will work from photographs.  Nor is it necessarily a problem that he was working from someone else’s photographs either.  No the problem is that Dylan didn’t give credit to the original work and made it sound like it was his own.  The gallery has worked very hard to smooth over the  problem but has also changed the description of the show as well.

No the real problem is that it’s a cheap and slightly sleazy move by an artist who shouldn’t have to stoop to this level.  It raises the question did Dylan know that he was cheating?  In which case he comes off as arrogant and cynical.  The other alternative is that the creative spirit has deserted the legendary singer/sonwriter to the point that he has to pass someone else’s creative work as his own.  Quoting the title of one of his early albums it’s “Another Side of Bob Dylan”.  A rather sad and pathetic coda to a brilliant and unique career.

Call that the View From the Phlipside