My drawing inspired by Vanessa Stockard

Intellectual property is something I’ve struggled with when preparing unit and lesson plans during this program. It’s easy to pull random images from Google to use in your slides, and you may never get called out for it (unless you’re trying to sell your resources), but it doesn’t sit right with me.

In the art world in general, theft of intellectual property has an elusive definition. Inspiration flows between artists, and a lot of my own drawings have been heavily influenced by the artists I admire. Having your own take on another piece of art, originally made, is not the same as reproduction. That being said, I think it’s important to attribute your source of inspiration. It’s kind of just… polite and respectful.

Vanessa Stockard’s original painting

When I posted this image to Instagram, I attributed the artist in my description, posted her own work with her Instagram handle, and tagged her in the original image. I took these steps based on what felt right for me, not based on a specific set of guidelines. Attribution is a lot more straightforward in academia than it is in any other context. It’s something we will have to navigate as educators. Personally, I try to use images from Wikimedia Commons rather than just from Google images.