Owen:

Your information is not complete... It is essentially sound - but just
widen out the issues a bit... see below.

Owen Lowe wrote:
In article 42,
"Henry St.Pierre" wrote:


If I had bought the statue and the goblet,decided it was crap; took a large
hammer to them and made smaller pieces of art - could the sculptor and
goblet artist take me to court for doing to my physical property what I
choose?


If you tried to profit from the resulting item, then yes - at least in
the US.

Profit is a not necessarily an issue. It might be but is not necessary
to make a case. There are at least two issues that could trigger a suit
here... "Reconfiguring a work to make money _might_ be one...

Taking a portion or reconfiguration of someone's work does not
constitute a new work giving you the rights to it.


Correct IMO - we concur on this. Indeed it would be a clear violation of
the "moral rights" of the artist.

You could throw it in the garbage at this point. No problem there.

If you display the broken piece - "as the artists work" then you
_definitely_ have a problem.



There are exceptions for critical comment, satire and such, but you'll
likely end up in court explaining why your new work should be exempt
under these exceptions - in other words, it's not an automatic exception.


Exactly, we concur, if you are making an attempt to disparage the other
persons work by creating something extremely close, but distorted copy
in a manner as to disparage, you have probably given them enough to file
suit. Since you are talking about "reconstructing" their creation.

A satirical drawing or copy should not (but might) draw fire. It depends
on the temperament of the offended artist and what they are willing to
pay a lawyer. A court would likely be willing to _hear_ the case, but it
would then be up to the artist to prove that the satirical work somehow
violated their copyright or moral rights. Not always an easy thing to do...

If you recall "The Wind Done gone"... A take-off of "Gone with the wind
"(GWTW). A lower court fond the satire to be a violation. An appellate
court found the satire allowable -- as I recall.

BUT!!!!! The new work was a new story. Not a simple rehash of the
original, or the old book with words crossed out and new words inserted etc.



--
Will
Occasional Techno-geek