Shepard Fairey Sues The A.P. Over Obama Image

Source: NY Times

In a pre-emptive strike, the street artist Shepard Fairey filed a lawsuit on Monday against The Associated Press, asking a federal judge to declare that he is protected from copyright infringement claims in his use of a news photograph as the basis for a now ubiquitous campaign poster image of President Obama.

The suit was filed in federal court in Manhattan after The Associated Press said it had determined that it owned the image, which Mr. Fairey used for posters and stickers distributed grass-roots style last year during the election campaign. The photo, showing Mr. Obama at the National Press Club in April 2006, was taken for The A.P. by a freelance photographer, Mannie Garcia.

According to the suit, A.P. officials contacted Mr. Fairey’s studio late last month demanding payment for the use of the photo and a portion of any money he makes from it.

Mr. Fairey’s lawyers, including Anthony T. Falzone, the executive director of the Fair Use Project and a law lecturer at Stanford University, contend in the suit that Mr. Fairey used the photograph only as a reference and transformed it into a “stunning, abstracted and idealized visual image that created powerful new meaning and conveys a radically different message” from that of the shot Mr. Garcia took.

more: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/10/arts/design/10fair.html?ref=arts

I wish he wouldn't complicate things by spray painting other people's property but still...... that AP image would have been lost to history had HE not made it his own ...... OUR own!

or wire news service. NOw there are OPINION pieces masquerading as news articles all over yahoo news from the AP.


I feel the apocolypse comin on.

With the internet, you don't need to rely on the AP to get local stories out. You can go directly to the local source.

.

n/t

And I was told that as long as you change a certain number of elements from the original it is not an infringement on that person's copyright.

lovingly posted for all the DU haters.. errrrr, "artists" who sided with Authorized Propaganda on this horseshit:

Further complicating the dispute, Mr. Garcia contends that he, not The Associated Press, owns the copyright for the photo, according to his contract with the The A.P. at the time. In a telephone interview on Monday, Mr. Garcia said he was unsure how he would proceed now that the matter had landed in court. But he said he was very happy when he found out that his photo was the source of the poster image and that he still is.