[two_third][dropcap]T[/dropcap]his series was inspired by the work of artist/writer Austin Kleon and those before him.  I had done similar pieces ages ago in school as a writing assignment but had long since forgotten about them.  After reading Kleon’s book Steal Like an Artist, I wanted to learn more about him and discovered his other book Newspaper Blackout — a collection of his poems redacted from the New York Times.  The whole concept of Steal Like an Artist is that nothing really is original and that artists are influenced by other artists and everything else they are exposed to both good and bad.  Artists throughout the ages have emulated their idols, their contemporaries, their influencers — it is how we learn, how we evolve as artists and as people.

After just an hour or so of redacting whatever I had handy, I was hooked. In homage to the influence, I have titled this series “Stolen” and stamp each piece as such with the date the poem was created.  My series has already evolved beyond that which influenced me and I hope, in turn, it will influence others after me.

My technique is pretty simple.  Like Kleon, I use permanent black markers to redact the newspaper or other printed printed material.  I then stamp the date and the word “Stolen” onto it and scan the whole thing.  That’s pretty much it![/two_third]