SAFE CREATIVE:

ITS ALLIANCE WITH ARTISTS ON THE INTERNET

Safe Creative, the largest electronic registry of intellectual property online, renews its collaboration with Art Madrid. This time with Arte & Palabra. Conversations with Carlos del Amor, a series of interviews with artists that is part of the Parallel Programme of Art Madrid'24.

IThe Internet presents creators with both a competitive advantage and a number of significant challenges in terms of exposure, performance, discovery, infringement and plagiarism. In 2007, this technology-based copyright registry was created so that Safe Creative could work with artists on the Internet to protect their rights. Today, with generative AI and NFTs, the challenges multiply and we respond to creators and artists of all kinds.

REGISTERING COPYRIGHTS IN THE INTERNET AGE

With the popularization of the Internet over the past 20 years, we have seen the needs of creators shift. We have moved from a limited and local creation and production to a global and massive one with immediate needs for protection and recognition. Registering copyrights in the Internet age must be equally fast, convenient and inexpensive. Safe Creative was born with the goal of providing technology as a tool to create the proofs the artists need before showing their work.

Safe Creative offers a convenient and cost-effective online system that allows any creator to obtain the necessary evidence to prove their copyrights from the comfort of their own home, using their own computer, and instantly register all their works.

THE COPYRIGHT REGISTRATION PROCESS IN THE CONTEXT OF ARTIDICIAL INTELLIGENCES

The need for authorship verification is more important than ever with the advent of Generative Artificial Intelligence (GAI). Registration in the context of AI is critical for two main reasons:

CERTIFY THE CREATIVE PROCESS

The first has to do with the future need for artists to be able to prove that they, and not a Generative Artificial Intelligence, created a particular work: We are only seeing the beginning of Generative Artificial Intelligences, and they will continue to improve over time. Being able to certify the creative process using Safe Creative will be critical to document that the work was, in fact, created by a human.

REGISTRATION OF WORK TO AVOID PLAGIARISM

Generative artificial intelligences are, in fact, fed by previous artistic creations. There is already controversy about the origin of the works that feed these algorithms, and some lawsuits have been filed, the outcome of which will be seen in the coming months and years. This is because they often use works not only from the public domain, but also from contemporary creators and artists, allegedly in violation of their rights.

Registering the work to defend against plagiarism provides an element to use in case it is used by one or more artificial intelligences in the future. Logically, informing of the fact of registration when the work is presented helps to deter traditional plagiarism by people who directly copy the work of other artists, and it helps to defend the copyright if the work is eventually used without the express authorization of the creator or owner.

ONLINE EXHIBITION AND SALE OF WORKS

Promoting yourself on the Internet and social networks is here to stay. Getting a name, setting up an online gallery, or combining physical presence in galleries and online are not questions of whether to do it, but how to do it as soon as possible and in the best possible way.

CONCLUSIONS

By law, rights exist when the work is created, and technological registers are the best tool to demonstrate the existence of these rights quickly and immediately, permanently and worldwide.

The artist can certify his creative process, register the work, show the work with its registration to discourage plagiarism and now also exhibit, sell and license his work. Each creator can use the tool as they wish and in combination with a physical presence in all types of galleries, whether virtual or physical, with the greatest security that technology can offer today worldwide.

The painting of Daniel Bum (Villena, Alicante, 1994) takes shape as a space for subjective elaboration, where the figure emerges not so much as a representational motif but as a vital necessity. The repetition of this frontal, silent character responds to an intimate process: painting becomes a strategy for navigating difficult emotional experiences—an insistent gesture that accompanies and alleviates feelings of loneliness. In this sense, the figure acts as a mediator between the artist and a complex emotional state, linking the practice of painting to a reconnection with childhood and to a vulnerable dimension of the self.

The strong autobiographical dimension of his work coexists with a formal distance that is not the result of conscious planning, but rather functions as a protective mechanism. Visual restraint, an apparent compositional coolness, and an economy of means do not neutralize emotion; instead, they contain it, avoiding the direct exposure of the traumatic. In this way, the tension between affect and restraint becomes a structural feature of his artistic language. Likewise, the naïve and the disturbing coexist in his painting as inseparable poles, reflecting a subjectivity permeated by mystery and unconscious processes. Many images emerge without a clearly defined prior meaning and only reveal themselves over time, when temporal distance allows for the recognition of the emotional states from which they arose.

The Long Night. Oil, acrylic, and charcoal on canvas. 160 × 200 cm. 2024.

The human figure appears frequently in your work: frontal, silent, suspended. What interests you about this presence that seems both affirmative and absent?

I wouldn’t say that anything in particular interests me. I began painting this figure because there were emotions I couldn’t understand and a feeling that was very difficult for me to process. This character emerged during a very complicated moment in my life, and the act of making it—and remaking it, repeating it again and again—meant that, during the process, I didn’t feel quite so alone. At the same time, it kept me fresh and connected me to an inner child who was broken at that moment, helping me get through the experience in a slightly less bitter way.

Santito. Acrylic and oil on canvas. 81 × 65 cm. 2025.

There is a strong affective dimension in your work, but also a calculated distance, a kind of formal coldness. What role does this tension between emotion and restraint play?

I couldn’t say exactly what role that tension plays. My painting is rooted in the autobiographical, in memory, and in situations I have lived through that were quite traumatic for me. Perhaps, as a protective mechanism—to prevent direct access to that vulnerability, or to keep it from becoming harmful—that distance appears unconsciously. It is not something planned or controlled; it simply emerges and remains there.

Night Painter. Acrylic on canvas. 35 × 27 cm. 2025.

Your visual language oscillates between the naïve and the unsettling, the familiar and the strange. How do these tensions coexist for you, and what function do they serve in your visual exploration?

I think it reflects who I am. One could not exist without the other. The naïve could not exist without the unsettling; for me, they necessarily go hand in hand. I am deeply drawn to mystery and to the act of painting things that even I do not fully understand. Many of the expressions or portraits I create emerge from the unconscious; they are not planned. It is only afterwards that I begin to understand them—and almost never immediately. A considerable amount of time always passes before I can recognize how I was feeling at the moment I made them.

Qi. Acrylic on canvas. 81 × 65 cm. 2025.

The formal simplicity of your images does not seem to be a matter of economy, but of concentration. What kind of aesthetic truth do you believe painting can reach when it strips itself of everything superfluous?

I couldn’t say what aesthetic truth lies behind that simplicity. What I do know is that it is something I need in order to feel calm. I feel overwhelmed when there are too many elements in a painting, and I have always been drawn to the minimal—to moments when there is little, when there is almost nothing. I believe that this stripping away allows me to approach painting from a different state: more focused, more silent. I can’t fully explain it, but it is there that I feel able to work with greater clarity.

Crucifixion. Acrylic on canvas. 41 × 33 cm. 2025.

To what extent do you plan your work, and how much space do you leave for the unexpected—or even for mistakes?

I usually feel more comfortable leaving space for the unexpected. I am interested in uncertainty; having everything under control strikes me as rather boring. I have tried it on some occasions, especially when I set out to work on a highly planned series, with fixed sketches that I then wanted to translate into painting, but it was not something I identified with. I felt that a fundamental part of the process disappeared: play—that space in which painting can surprise even myself. For that reason, I do not tend to plan too much, and when I do, it is in a very simple way: a few lines, a plane of color. I prefer everything to happen within the painting itself.