Hey everyone,
My name is Zach Northington and I am the artist who did the picture of the girl's face with the blue eye at The Silos at Southend. I am very glad to hear that many of you like my artwork, but I am also disappointed to hear that some of you think it is plagiarized.
A few weeks ago I was contacted by a Charlotte Observer reader who accused me of the same thing. I sent him a response explaining how my picture is not plagiarized. After reading some of the comments on this thread, I thought I would post a part of my response to the Observer reader to clear things up.
Here was my response:
I do agree that my picture uses an idea that is portrayed in the book Jennifer Government, but the pictures are very different. My picture uses a tight shot of the whole side of a face, where as the cover of the book is a close up shot of a girl's upper cheek/ eye. My picture is shot straight on, and the cover of of book's picture is shot at an angle with the eye looking upward. Finally my picture is much darker then the cover of Jennifer Government. Mine uses darker colors in the background, skin, and even the eye. The only thing my picture has in common with the cover of Jennifer Government is the use of a barcode, which I thought up myself.
I had never even heard of the book Jennifer Government when I made my picture, let alone seen its cover. My picture was made in October of 2007 and I first heard about Jennifer Government only a few months ago, well after my picture was recommended to Mr. Crawford for the Silos at Southend project.
I was not only influenced by 1984, but by a number of other books, including Brave New World, and a book called Neuromancer by William Gibson. Therefore, my picture does not reflect any one book, but the mood and themes in many books.
Anyways, thank you all for the feedback. I am very excited to see the project when it is all done.
-Zach
