Was Leonardo da Vinci not an artist when he drew the Vitruvian Man? Were all Renaissance sculptors and painters for that matter not artists, since they were cop

Was Leonardo da Vinci not an artist when he drew the Vitruvian Man? Were all Renaissance sculptors and painters for that matter not artists, since they were copying the Greco-Roman style? Are script-writers of House of Cards not artists due to writing a Shakespearean play? Is George Lucas not an artist because he did not make anyone question what art is? > Duchamp also said "Art is either plagiarism or revolution". So unless you are doing Greco-Roman statuary in a manner that shatters people's expectations of Greco-Roman statuary, your statues are a jejune copy of what has come before -- and therefore not art. Here is a contradiction. First plagiarism is listed as an example of art, to then be described as "not art". Also, I think that art which sticks to established understanding of what art is isn't necessarily plagiarism. Just because there were plenty of standard 3-act structured plays/films, does not mean that subsequent attempts are plagiaristic. Otherwise art would be castrated to just form, when in fact it is a marriage of form and substance. I think this fixation on "subverting expectations" comes from self-centredness of some artists. Maybe if you dedicate your whole life to just art, you don't have other experiences to draw from to create something about more than art itself. And so art becomes a simulacrum.