Beth at Design Drama weighs in on the Miley Cyrus thing that has been dominating tweendom recently.

I read a couple of blog posts on the topic and there was one comment on there that made me think about the big picture where art was concerned. This commenter (named “NM”) raised a point that the photo of MC in the sheet reminded her of David’s “Death of Marat” and how the photo, if the lipstick was removed, looked like a corpse. She was right, and I then realized why the photo had a familiar quality to me.

Did Leibovitz do this intentionally? Who is to say except the photographer herself, but it’s an interesting underlying commentary, whether it’s about how Hollywood eats it’s young* or the fact that these young girls today are dancing a dangerous jig on a precipice while in the hot lights of the media glare and everyone’s thinking “jump!”

Anyway, the whole conversation surrounding these MC photos started another thought process on whether there’s really anything new in art. The title of this post is me ripping a line from U2’s “The Fly” in which the lyric goes “… every artist is a cannibal, every poet is a thief…”

Today, it seems so many visual, musical and lyrical artistic statements are a reaction to something that has come before. When I listen to Tom Petty’s latest album, Highway Companion, I constantly hear guitar riffs that are snippets of some of his earlier work. At least he’s ripping off himself, though.

Good feedback. Personally, I think that the Cyrus thing was a planned PR thing although I really didn’t have as much trouble with it.

And if Annie wants to take my picture, I’m all for it.

Of course, I’m in my 40s and not 15.