Copyright Law
Art Law Gray Area: ‘Transformative’ or Just Plain Copying?
Posted Jan 29, 2009, 06:45 pm CST
By Martha Neil
When "appropriationist" artist Richard Prince saw some photographs of Rastafarians in a book, he copied them onto his computer and then onto his canvases.
Adding to the images in ways that those who don't appreciate his work might consider akin to penciling in a mustache on a picture of a villain, Prince then created a collage-like painting he calls Inquisition, according to the Wall Street Journal (sub. req.).
Among those who aren't fans of his creation is the photographer who took the original pictures, Patrick Cariou. Last month he sued Prince in federal court in New York, asserting copyright infringement claims.
His case isn't open and shut, attorney John Koegel tells the newspaper, because what is and isn't a transformative use of an original work is intended to be a gray area of copyright law.
"The law states that the use of a copyrighted image is transformative based on the ordinary lay observer's sense of if the new work is different and how different it is," Koegel says. "It is very much of a visual thing, and there is no bright line that artists can go by."