Legal Information

Vatican Sued for Stealing Street Art

Street artist sues Vatican for using Christ image on Easter stamp: 'I couldn’t believe it'

Nicole Winfield
Associated Press (LINK, with photos)

ROME – One night in early 2019, Rome street artist Alessia Babrow glued a stylized image of Christ she had made onto a bridge near the Vatican. A year later, she was shocked to learn that the Vatican had apparently used a reproduction of the image, which featured Babrow’s hallmark heart emblazoned across Christ’s chest, as its 2020 Easter postage stamp.

Babrow sued the Vatican city-state’s telecommunications office in a Rome court last month, alleging it was wrongfully profiting off her creativity and violating the intent of her artwork. The lawsuit, which is seeking nearly 130,000 euros ($160,000) in damages, said the Vatican…

Copyright Aspects of Street Art and Graffiti

Brooklyn Street Art (BSA) WRITER’S BENCH : “STREET ART AND GRAFFITI: THE ROLE OF COPYRIGHT” BY ENRICO BONADIO
May 4, 2021
DIRECT LINK

PHOTO: Banksy's works are frequently taken off walls, resold, etc. - all with questionable provenance. This original in San Francisco was taken off a wall and its "ownership" is still not clear beyond the fact that the artist will not authenticate the provenance.

Like graffiti writers sharing black books and styles, BSA Writer’s Bench presents today’s greatest thinkers in an OpEd column. Scholars, historians, academics, authors, artists,…

Banksy Has Legal Troubles

Banksy trademark 'at risk' after street artist loses legal battle
Anonymous artist loses case against greeting card firm over use of Flower Thrower mural

The Guardian UK
Lanre Bakare Arts and culture correspondent
Thu 17 Sep 2020 10.21 BST
Last modified on Thu 17 Sep 2020 11.31 BST

Banksy’s trademark may be at risk after the street artist lost a case that an EU panel said was brought in bad faith and was undermined by a gift shop he set up in London last year.

Banksy lost the…

2nd Circuit Upholds VARA, and 5Pointz Decision

A Stunning Legal Decision Just Upheld a $6.75 Million Victory for the Street Artists Whose Works Were Destroyed at the 5Pointz Graffiti Mecca

The ruling shuts down the defendant's claims on practically every count.

Eileen Kinsella, February 20, 2020
Artnet.com article here

In a sweeping 32-page decision eviscerating the legal arguments of a disgruntled Queens real estate developer, a US Appeals Court affirmed the rights and monetary damages awarded to a group of graffiti artists whose works were destroyed without warning or consent in 2013.

The artists sued the developer, Gerald Wolkoff, in 2013 for violating their rights after he whitewashed their work at the famous 5Pointz graffiti art mecca in New York to make way for…

The fraught business of removing and selling street art murals

The fraught business of removing and selling street art murals
Published on CNN, 20th January 2020 (LINK)

Written by Christy Kuesel

This article was published in partnership with Artsy, the global platform for discovering and collecting art. The original article can be seen here.

Banksy is well known for creating murals in the dead of night, frequently addressing social ills like homelessness or poverty. Tourists and fans gather around each of his new creations, often spurred to the site by a post on the anonymous artist's Instagram account. So the idea of…

Face-Scanning Tech Expanding in USA, EU

Fight against facial recognition hits wall across the West
The result is an impasse that has left tech companies largely in control of where and how to deploy facial recognition.

By JANOSCH DELCKER and CRISTIANO LIMA (POLITICO)
12/30/2019 05:03 AM EST

Face-scanning technology is inspiring a wave of privacy fears as the software creeps into every corner of life in the United States and Europe — at border crossings, on police vehicles and in stadiums, airports and high schools. But efforts to check its spread are hitting a wall of resistance on both sides of the Atlantic.

One big reason: Western governments are embracing this technology for their own use, valuing security and data collection over privacy and civil liberties. And in Washington, President Donald Trump’s impeachment and the death of a key civil rights and privacy champion have…

Twitter Stencils Cause a... twitter (SF)

Twitter ad campaign runs afoul of city vandalism laws
EXAMINER STAFF; Sep. 12, 2019 4:45 a.m.; LINK with photos

Some BART riders have called a recent Twitter ad blitz around Powell Station “irritating” and “overkill,” but city officials are calling it illegal.

Or at least part of it.

The social media company launched an ad campaign this week in San Francisco and New York City that covered the walls of the station with images of user tweets about Twitter.

All well and good, if potentially annoying for some viewers, but the campaign continued outside with sidewalk chalk stencils extending into the Tenderloin — and that puts it in breach of The City’s vandalism laws, the Department of Public Works said Thursday.

“Our sidewalks are not to be used for commercial purposes, they are not billboards,” said Rachel Gordon, a spokesperson for…

Broken Windows, Again?! Battle against taggers in SF, 2018 Recap

Battle against taggers makes its mark as San Francisco’s graffiti plague eases
SF Chron (LINK)
Evan Sernoffsky Jan. 4, 2019 Updated: Jan. 4, 2019 4 a.m.

They usually strike at night. Spray can in hand, they scrawl their crude tags on San Francisco’s historic brick facades, business windows and sidewalks.

And when morning reveals the destructive spree of graffiti, the vandals are usually long gone, leaving property owners with a stubborn cleanup job — possibly even a fine.

But thanks to an aggressive new strategy by police and prosecutors, such incidents of vandalism appear to be in decline, according to the latest numbers. Reports of graffiti to 311 have hit an all-time low since the city started tracking the data at the start of 2016.

There were 3,371 such calls in November compared with 7,611 reported during March,…

New Orleans Mural Sparks Constitutional Battle

Anti-Trump Mural Sparks ACLU Lawsuit and Public Art Dispute in New Orleans
Shortly after putting up a mural on his private property last year, Neal Morris received a letter from the city demanding its immediate removal and threatening jail time.
Benjamin Sutton for Hyperallergic

<< Cashy-D's anti-Trump mural in New Orleans (photo courtesy and © Neal Morris

Late last year, New Orleans developer Neal Morris commissioned the local artist Cashy-D to paint a mural on his private property. On November 4, the artist completed the piece, which…

H&M Lawsuit Against Street Artist Could Have Changed Copyright Law

H&M Lawsuit Against Street Artist Could Have Changed Copyright Law [UPDATED]
The clothing company claims it has dropped its lawsuit against the artist Revok after widespread outcry and calls for a boycott, though the artist’s lawyer claims that is not true.
Claire VoonMarch 15, 2018
Hyperallergic

Update, 3/15/2018, 4:30pm: According to the Daily Beast, H&M has withdrawn its lawsuit. It shared the following statement:

H&M respects the creativity and uniqueness of artists, no matter the medium. We should have acted differently in our approach to this matter. It was never our intention to set a precedent concerning public art or to influence the debate on the legality of street art.  As a result, we are withdrawing the complaint filed in court. We are currently reaching out directly to the artist in question to come up with a solution.…