GVA: The creative opportunities afforded by machinima are greatly constrained by existing copyright law, which prohibits many possible uses, including commercial purposes. What’s your take on the paradoxical nature of this Artform?
I view the copyright issue as appropriation: It’s a complicated issue, one that can be argued from both sides. However within my work I view the video game as another art space to explore my practice, in certain situations it is appropriate to gain permission from the developers depending on the type of work and if it’s being sold. Richard Prince is a good example of how extreme things can get with appropriation if massive amounts of money are involved, but with his Instagram series the people who posted the images lose ownership because it’s on a platform where that image can be taken by anyone. Video games on the other hand always will be the developer’s game, the game was meant to be played not appropriated.
GVA: Would you agree that machinima has democratized the art making process, as some critics have suggested? Has it lowered the entry barrier for creators of video art, as some critics argue?
I do agree that machinima has democratized the art making process in its lowest form by that I mean you just have to buy the game to create work. However to create machinima it requires another level of creative drive; you have to have a conceptual idea and then you need to understand how you can create that within the boundaries of video games. But in its simplest form, yes, machinima has democratized the art making process.