And another informative reply:

> Condé Nast, the publishing conglomerate whose titles include Vogue,
> House & Garden, Vanity Fair and, since March, [the Tate Museum's]
> magazine, Tate, has blocked the display of work by British artist
> Graham Dolphin at the Barbican Centre in London.
[...]
> http://www.theartnewspaper.com/news/article.asp?idart=10455
[...]
> My question: did the artist require the publisher's permission at all?

--------------

Under UK law there is no right to prevent the creation of adaptations
(more or less equivalent to derivative works under US law) of an artistic
work.  I can't see a moral rights-based argument being successful.   If
the new moral rights provisions mean that artists can use moral rights
to control how lawful copies of their work are used in a collage, it
makes a complete mockery of the distinction between artistic works and
other types of works with respect to adaptations!  I can't see the
conservative English courts venturing down that path although European
courts may.

There may be some trademark arguments but I don't think there is any
serious suggestion that Conde Nast had endorsed the art work or indeed
that the artist is using the Conde Nast trademarks as a mark in trade
and commerce.  For an article on parody and trademark see
Gredley and Maniatis "Parody: a fatal attraction" [1997] EIPR 339.

My suspicion is that permission was sought for one of three reasons:
 - Conde Nast is known to be litigious and apparently had already
   threatened the artist and nobody wanted the risk of an expensive
   trial regardless of the likely outcome;
 - the artist got bad legal advice; or
 - the artist (or exhibitor) knew permission would be denied and
   thought it would be a good publicity stunt.

> Is there an equivalent to the First Sale Doctrine in the UK?  The works
> are apparently collage; they do not *reproduce* the magazines:

The doctrine is called "exhaustion" in the UK.  Under an EU directive,
this applies for the first sale in the EEA but not outside the EEA:
http://www.parliament.the-stationery-office.co.uk/pa/cm199899/cmselect/cmtrdind/380/38007.htm#a5
http://www.parliament.the-stationery-office.co.uk/pa/cm199899/cmselect/cmtrdind/380/38012.htm
http://www.hugheshubbard.com/news/news_detail.asp?NewsID=32
--
| Tim Arnold-Moore, Ph.D., LL.B., B.Sc. (Hons)
|                  AUSTRALIA




---
You are currently subscribed to mcn_mcn-l as: [email protected]
To unsubscribe send a blank email to 
[email protected]

Reply via email to