Tao Lin’s work is interesting because it makes the normally abstract philosophical questions of authorship in art suddenly a bit more tangible. Should we care w

Tao Lin’s work is interesting because it makes the normally abstract philosophical questions of authorship in art suddenly a bit more tangible. Should we care what creator says about creator’s own art? People see all sorts of layers of meaning in his work, and he personally methodically debunks every such finding[0]. One might wonder, are we doing the same to works of authors who are no longer alive to correct us? Does it matter that we do it? Does author’s intent matter, or only our interpretation of the work? My personal view has been gradually trending from “it only matters if I like it” to we should (if we are aware of it), we probably do, it does (and we shouldn’t), and yes, creators and their intent matter (although it doesn’t mean we can’t make our own conclusions and have own takeaways). Tao Lin somewhat contributed to that. [0] Some suspect he might be doing it ironically, in what I guess would then be an immense art project encompassing his whole life.