Rogers Vs. Koons

Art Rogers, Puppies (left) , Jeff Koons, String of Puppies (right)

Photographer Art Rogers shot a photo of a couple holding a line of puppies in a row and sold it for use in greeting cards and other similar products. Jeff Koons who are renowned artist internationally ran across Rogers photograph when he is in the process of creating an exhibit on the banality of everyday items. Koons used Rogers photo and created several statues based on the image and managed to sold it for a large profit. Upon the discovery of the copy, Rogers filed a suit against Koons for copyright infringement dated October 1991. Koon defend himself by claiming fair use by parody.

Outcome

The court Found substantial similarity and that koons had access to the picture. The similarity was so close that the average lay person would recognize the copying, a measure of evaluation. Thus the sculpture was found to be a copy of the work of Rogers.

On the issue of fair use, the court rejected the parody argument, as Koons could have constructed his parody of that general type of art without copying Rogers specific work. That is, Koons was no commenting on Rogers' work specifically, and so his copying of that work did not fall under the fair use exception.

Discussion

Can you use other's photography for own use ? 

With the rapid development of search engines such as google , yahoo, bing, etc... we can get a hold of tons of photographs on internet that taken by professional photographer and normal netizen easily. The questions is " can we use the photograph we download from internet for purposes such as presentation , online advertising , art creation , etc ?"

We could have violate copyright laws if we used the photos without any consent and complying to the fair use terms as stated in the copyright law. 

Personal Comment

My opinion is , it is hard for us to determine whether we are violating copyright law when we copying photos from internet due to insufficient knowledge in law, So it is important for us to check the source of the photo and make sure there is a correct citation and credit for the original creator to be include in the assignments, presentation, works. Of cause, the best way to avoid copyright infringement is to create your own original art !

Source : Rogers. Vs Koons - Wikipedia