My thinking is, selling someone else's art is really gross, right?
It would be easy to tell him to take it down. I complain, make a threat, he could whine or argue but would probably comply. I go about my day, sitting on that thing I drew in 2014, he goes off to sell whatever he can get his hands on, both parties move on and learn little.
It could be easy...OR...we do the difficult but impactful route.
Let's let him be gross. Let's let people SEE him be gross. Because looking at his gallery, the pieces that aren't his clearly stick out like a sore thumb. He will never be able to recreate anything like that piece. And potential buyers will see that, and might even press for an explanation.
Imagine the response he may give. Imagine how he would try to explain it without sounding like a narcissist, why he's selling something that contains a massive signature of someone else's name on it.
Let the red flags fly, high and bright enough for others to see. There's a potential for him to learn a lesson in humility from such a negative or awkward experience from this. Selling a piece this old indicates not only desperation, but creative staleness. It makes me wonder why he is unable to generate something himself?
What if all he wanted was drama? The funnier response would be not to argue.
What if all he wanted was attention? By not caring about the 2014 commission, this crypto gallery may fade into obscurity sooner than later.
What if all he wanted was money? I would be surprised if people bought this enough to make me feel like I'm missing out on something.
People typically dish out money to get their original creations made to their exact specifications by artists who could render that image in such a way that the customer themselves could not express. I do not understand or am unaware of a demographic of consumers that seek out and buy other people's non-porn OC's, and do so with obscure cryptos.
That doesn't make sense to me. Especially if this, precise content he's trying to sell, is free to download and view. Whoever gives him money for that is a fool in the first place, and it would be money swindled out of the gullible, making the profit unethical, to which I still wouldn't want that money.
He winds up looking like an asshole for selling it, I move on with my life without spending money on a legal team fighting him over it.
He either gives up when it doesn't sell like he hoped it would, or he doubles down in a lazier venture in desperation. Which would secure his trajectory in creative bankruptcy.
The best counter-assault I could give to an egotistical narcissist is to not play their games in their way, ignore them, and continue to make art that they never could.
Besides. I need to make more things more often. I spent all this time criticizing...it's time to remind myself what I'm capable of.
