I first came across Solaas work (Note that I didn't call him an artist; I leave that up for you to decide) a year ago when I was surfing the Web. He's a philosophy major who is self taught in computer mediums and now makes a living designing web sites.
A lot (if not all) of the art I see today is derivatory; it has origins from another art form, style, artist etc. I suppose that this thought that original ideas are harder to come across reflect the overarching postmodern theme of today's society (Remember how many times that one annoying kid mentioned "postmodern" in your section?). However, it is interesting to see that when certain forms of art seem more derivatory than others, they are considered "lesser art" (ie. reproductions of famous art are seen as less "art-ful" than say a painting in the Renaissance).
I find Solaas' piece, Migrations, fascinating because it is conceptual yet does not presume that he is the primary architect of his enterprise. He specifically mentions that the text comes from two different sources, the BBC and Don Quixote, and primarily acts as the medium through which these two texts "speak." I think it's a nice reference back to the times when artists were seen as craftsmen instead of the modern stereotype of the egotistical crazy.
Before I forget, The Link: http://www.solaas.com.ar/leo/node/6
One of the reasons why this piece continues to intrigue is the fact that although the piece itself is somewhat simplistically constructed, the ideas are established compellingly enough so that they stay in my mind afterwards. I am interested to see the work of a person who focuses on bridging the connections between mediums (text and images) in a format that is not normally considered artistic (the Internet). Words have the potential to be visual and now I see that they can be architectural, active (like active voice in English class), and living.
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