Monday, April 13, 2009

"I could be a really bad photographer, but in that case why did you use 30 of my pictures?" (UPDATED)

While I was defending the honor of Art in America's new editorial team last week, The Art Newspaper had a report on the status of the Richard Prince copyright lawsuit. Prince and Gagosian have answered Cariou's complaint, and now it's on to discovery. Cariou is quoted as saying "he has already received a 'settlement proposal' that he would consider for a 'just' amount. 'But it’s a big number we’re talking about,' he says."

UPDATE: Photo Editor Rob Haggart says the responses include "the standard 'these images are not that distinctive' and 'I’ve made them better'" claims, and he points out that Shepard Fairey "is doing the same thing with the Mannie Garcia image he used for his Obama poster .... But, of course [Fairey] also said he sorted through thousands of images to find the one he wanted to copy for the poster so that doesn’t really sound like 'any image will do' now does it." He's predicting settlement.