Am I wrong, but are you the guy that also reproduced Hirst Dots?

If you keep this up, you could be entering very bad territory, as both Hirst and Banksy have been prosecuting forgers.

I only say this in your interest as my wife is an IP attorney and prosecutes this sort of thing regularly.

Fair use or not, why not just do something original?

I wouldn't worry about all the copyright bollox, nothing's happened to the west country prince (yet) and he's made thousands from his little venture.

No, not legal advice by any means

Just worried for the guy, I thought he did a brilliant job on those Hirst dots, but was surprised to see this. This is a public website and that could be trouble down the road if they get passed off as real later... He seems like he is doing it in good fun, but attorneys do not believe in good intentions. At the end of the day they are either counterfeit or forgerys, either way not good.

Please do not
-Put up signs saying "strictly no photographs" when all you do is sell photographs of my graffiti
-Write 'Banksy' next to an image of a panda waving hand guns (not mine, don’t know whose it is)
-Take images off my website and ‘license’ them for a huge fee to a fucking German calendar company

Haha, that last one was funny as #$%$

anyone want to buy my s**tty stencils i made on a tray??


Since I know you guys don't like pm offers..

£7k

Contact by pm

If you document a work on the street, it is yours to sell.'Technically' it is your photograph which is being sold.

Copyrights, along with trademarks, service marks, patents, etc. are all different forms of intellectual property, the rights to which are governed by law. When an artist creates an image, under current law, they have an automatic copyright in the image, which includes the sole right to exploit the work, by making copies of it and selling them. That is why even when you buy an original canvas, unless you separately negotiate obtaining all of the rights to the work, including the copyright, the artist could then put out a set of giclees of the image you bought. Similarly, no one else can invade the artist's copyright, without obtaining permission to do so, otherwise it is copyright infringement.

So, taking a picture of an artist's work, does technically create another work, but if the central theme of the picture is the art piece itself, then it is trodding on the copyright. If, on the other hand, a small image of the artwork was in the wall in the background of a picture of two people in a museum, it would not be a copyright issue.

But when you set out to essentially copy another artist's work, and sell them for money, no matter how little, it is copyright infringement, no matter how you try to explain it. With respect to Banksy, I believe that he essentially voluntarily relinquished the rights in much of his original street art, which is why you see so many knock-offs on ebay and elsewhere. But with respect to his art prints, you don't see the same companies selling those, precisely because they would be infringing on the copyrights.

No, there is no issue with Tesco and copyright infringement. "Tesco" is a trademark. The design of the label and colour scheme are most likely classified as a design trademark, which is also protected. I could not open up a soup company, and name it Bescto, and use a similar colour scheme on my label, as that would violate both trademarks, the first just being a plain infringement on its tradename, and the second infringement being likely to confuse or mislead the public into thinking that they are buying Tesco soup, not Bestco soup. It is a thin line, and you will see competitors designing similar e.g. same colour packaging, and somewhat close names, but they are being very careful to stay exactly on the right side of the line to avoid getting sued, which could include having to recall and destroy all of the infringing product.

A painting of a soup can is both a transformative work, meaning that you have so clearly departed from just a soup can, that there is no likelihood of someone confusing a painting for an actual soup can, as well as being interpretive--the artist's view of the can as painted on the canvas.

With respect to your second question regarding a Coke can, just look back at the history behind the Tesco cans. Things started when Andy Warhol first painted the Campbell's Tomato Soup cans. That original concept has then morphed from one brand to another, and from the original colour scheme to numerous variant colourways.

I could not paint and sell a copy of a Warhol soup can, if it is so similar to the original that it would both confuse the public as to which is which, or cause the original artist to lose sales because of the availability of the infringing work. If you painted your own Coke can in a particular style, then if someone just began reproducing your work, you could go after them for infringement. Again, a lot of this involves very thin, and very hard to see fine lines, but that is why intellectual property lawyers have a job. Hope this helps somewhat.

Cheers Hooker, replied to all PM's awaiting a few more details from some responses, no definites yet.

Deal done, a huge thanks to those who got in touch and offered up some lovely pieces, happy with the outcome.

Bump..

Hi

I have a complete set of soup cans (number 3/12 all) as well as an original in pink and yellow if you are interested