First of all, thank you for the update.  This is an important issue and
one that could come up for any of us who exhibit contemporary art--that
is, the issue of an artist "appropriating" images from another artist.
There were some celebrated cases several years ago, one involving Andy
Warhol, and one involving Jeff Koons.  In both cases the photographs were
translated into different media--a silkscreen painting and a sculpture
respectively, but my recollection is that the photographers won, or were
able to obtain a settlement in both cases.  (Maybe someone else on the list
can confirm more authoritatively.)  And I <think> that the fact that the
images were basically faithfully reproduced led to the findings in the
photographers' favor.  I am an artist myself, and after I read your post
I asked myself how I would feel if I produced a work for a magazine as a
"work-for-hire" and gave them the copyright, and then found out that
another artist had copied it fairly faithfully.  Given that I myself no
longer had rights to my own work, I think I'd resent someone else, who
hadn't paid me, helping themselves to it.  My sympathies in the Warhol
and Koons cases were with the photographers.  Just my $.02.

--Helen Glazer
Exhibitions Director
Goucher College, Baltimore, MD, USA
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On Fri, 22 Mar 1996, Melanie Solomon wrote:

> My conflicts relate more to artistic expression.  It seems to me that
> copyright law is clear on the rights re. making money off of work, but still
> does not adequately address the boundaries of what an artist--or a
> corporation, or anyone--has a right to claim as solely theirs.  Is it
> legitimate for someone to claim that no derivative artworks are permitted?  I
> would hate to see artistic freedom stamped out because the artist needs legal
> permissions to interpret what he/she sees.
>