Artists are actively collaborating with others when bringing an idea to life, especially if it’s commission work or part of a project. I think of the artist who in listening to an entrepreneur who needs a logo for their new company can imagine it and put it on paper. They input other’s ideas into their minds and extract a vision for it. This is active collaboration and it also happens when the artist has to put their mark on a project without any input on the original idea. Take for example the Jordan 4 iconic shoe that was released in 1989 and re-released in 2017 as a gray suede version as part of a collaboration with the artist, KAWS. This is collaboration by KAWS stamping his signature style on the 1989 idea.
That’s collaboration on projects — then there’s collaboration with the tools for creation. The pencil can only do so much and so the artist collaborates with this medium to create as they collaborate with newer tools like an iPad pencil on a drawing app where the pencil has many different brushes. The artist has to collaborate with the medium to bring the creation out.
Artists are collaborators and the collaboration can take many forms.