"I have to be honest—I don’t like the sound of this"

Paddy Johnson wonders about the strength of the Rose lawsuit.

Balancing Act

Eric Felten writes in the Wall Street Journal on the National Portrait Gallery-Wikipedia dispute:

"Copyright law exists for a purpose: to make creativity pay. Making accurate photographic copies of paintings is no doubt valuable and involves painstaking work. But it isn’t—and isn’t meant to be—creative. With all the digital assaults on the old copyright verities, the champions of intellectual property can’t afford to waste their energies trying to monopolize images that already properly belong to us all."

Forgery Suit

Josh Baer: "ACA Galleries Inc have sued Joseph Kinney alleging that he sold them a Milton Avery painting 'Summer Table Gloucester' for $200,000 in 2007 that was a forgery. They assert that Kinney actually bought the work for $65,000 from Angela Hamblin who had been convicted of other art forgeries." Related post, from 2007, here.

Another Bull Suit

Arturo Di Modica, who created the famous "Charging Bull" sculpture near Wall Street, has sued Random House and the authors of a new book about the collapse of Lehman Brothers for using the sculpture on the book's cover without permission. Story here. Previous suit mentioned here.

Leibovitz Suit (UPDATED 2X)

Art Capital Group is suing photographer Annie Leibovitz. Story in the NYT City Room blog here. The Art Market Monitor has more. Art Capital's loans to Leibovitz were mentioned in a front-page NYT story on art-based lending back in February.

UPDATE: Much more from Felix Salmon.

UPDATE 2: Still more from the Art Market Monitor: "It would appear that both sides in this battle have made a bad deal."

Clearwater Cuts Bait

The city of Clearwater, Florida has agreed to pay $55,000 to settle the fish mural first amendment case mentioned earlier here. The bait shop owner gets to keep his mural up; the money goes to the ACLU.

A Clean Desk is a Sign of a Sick Mind

My desk at the end of the day.
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