Your Instagram Pic Could Be Sold For RM327,000 But You're Not Getting A Single Sen From It
Looks like setting your Instagram account to 'Private' may be a wiser move in the long run.
By Samantha Khor — 28 May 2015, 07:25 PM
How much is your Instagram photo worth? This one, posted by Instagram celebrity Doe Deere, supposedly fetched $90,000 (RM327,528) at a recent art show in New York.
Deere is also the CEO of Lime Crime Inc., a make-up company.
But here's the kicker - the above artwork was created without the permission of whoever owns the original Instagram account, nor were they notified about it. In fact, that applies to every piece presented at the exhibit.
Artist and photographer Richard Prince's recent works - titled 'New Portraits' - features a series of portraits that are actually blown-up screenshots of images other people have uploaded onto Instagram, which are then printed on canvas
Among the people featured in the series include models and celebrities such as Kate Moss, Sky Ferreira, and Pamela Anderson, as well as a racy selection of scantily-clad women.
If you're wondering if this is an act of copyright infringement, here's where it gets a little iffy.
While Prince leaves the images and usernames untouched, the original captions are removed and replaced with Prince's own captions under the username 'richardprince4'. According to US copyright laws, the minor changes could qualify and meet the requirements of fair use.
If he were to make perfect replicas, it would be a clear infringement of the original artists’ rights. However, fair use may apply if the work is “transformative.”
The minor changes Prince adds to each original Instagram photo help each work to meet the requiements of fair use. Similarly, parody is generally protected from claims of copyright infringement under US law.
businessinsider.my
Even if taken to court, it is unlikely that the original Instagram users will win the case due to the fair use doctrine, as it protects certain kinds of copying when it is deemed "beneficial" to the society and/or adds new meaning or context to the original work
Copyright law gives people rights to encourage creativity. Although copying someone else’s creative work without paying for it is often against the law, certain kinds of copying isn’t. The fair use doctrine protects some kinds of copying when doing so is beneficial to society. For example, a reviewer can reproduce a portion of a book or movie in order to criticize it.
Additionally, copyright law allows people to copy others’ work when the new work is sufficiently “transformative” of the original. When the new work adds new meaning to the original and places it in a different context, courts will tend to treat it as a fair use.
Prince would likely argue that his use of the photographs is different from use by the original authors. The Instagram users intended the pictures to display aspects of their lives, their new shoes, or what they had for dinner. Prince, however, would claim that he is using the photos for very different reasons. Perhaps he is commenting on the photos themselves through his new “comments.” Or perhaps he is using them to express something about modern society.
This is not the first time the contemporary artist has "borrowed" another person's artwork to aid his own. Well-known for his photographic reproductions and neo-conceptual works, Prince has been taking others' work and repurposing them in slightly different ways since the late 1970s.
Prince has been taken to court before for his appropriation, but has always won his cases because his work falls under “fair use,” a copyright law that permits limited use of copyrighted material without acquiring the permission of rights holders.
hellogiggles.comPrince reached a settlement with photographer Patrick Cariou, who accused the artist of breaking copyright laws by using his pictures of Rastafarians in his paintings, which sold for millions.
dailymail.co.uk
An example of the alterations Prince had made, featured in Art In America magazine.
Image via Richard Prince / Art in America MagazineWhile Deere has no plans to pursue any legal action against Prince, another subject of Prince's "artwork" has come up with a genius way to fight back against the purported theft.
In a statement issued by SuicideGirls co-founder Missy Suicide, the following print will be sold at a tiny fraction of the price Prince has tagged on to his work.
"Do we have Mr. Prince’s permission to sell these prints? We have the same permission from him that he had from us," she said, accompanied by a winky face emoticon.
Read the full statement here.
It is somewhat disturbing to know that a photo you've uploaded onto Instagram could potentially end up in an art gallery and sold for thousands without your knowledge
Barring the obvious "set your Instagram account to 'Private'" warning, be careful of what you post on social media. It's one thing to have someone else making loads of money off while infringing upon your copyright, it's another to have a bunch of private photos end up being in the public eye.