Re: Fair Use Question?

From: Kevin J. Comerford <czbb020[_at_]access.texas.gov>
Date: Wed, 16 Mar 1994 23:19:04 -0600 (CST)

On Wed, 16 Mar 1994, Maryly Snow wrote:
> >
> >Museums seem to be holding onto "their" copyright because they make
> >money through their rights and reproductions offices, but the
> >objects belong in the cultural domain once the creator's original
> >copyright has lapsed. In response to museums trying so ardently to
> >"protect" their images, I heard one librarian say to another at the
> >VRA Reception "who would have ever thought that museums would be our
> >enemy"? It was shocking thing to say, and I was shocked to find
> >myself agreeing with it.

The confusion about rights and reproductions services is understandable, but Maryly's conclusions are naive (not trying to flame you, Maryly). I'll illustrate with an almost amusing anecdote which involves a well-meaning librarian. I was invited to see a demonstration of a public access software system developed in-house at a nearby library. The librarian had scanned a number of our Museum's finest permanent collection artworks and combined the images, which were of shockingly poor quality, with completely inaccurate and erroneous caption and credit information, all bundled in a nifty GUI interface. The librarian even credited the images to the 'Dallas Museum of Fine Arts,' an institutional designation that we have not used for over ten years.

This is not an isolated incident, either. I witness a veritable feast of intellectual carnage on any day of the week. After a number of years of rights and reproductions experience, I feel safe in saying that many (not all, certainly) in the scholarly, education, and information professions are simply not attentive enough to the quality and accuracy of the information (visual and textual) they reproduce to be left to their own devices, unsupervised as it were. Sad commentary on our MTV-based sound-byte society. The only way to control irresponsibility and fulfill our mission to the public is to maintain current documentary copyright on our works of art, and restrict photographic access to those works to responsible individuals (and unfortunately, that isn't even enough alot of the time). That is the real purpose of museum Rights and Reproductions services.

As for the cost, well it costs money to maintain these controls, so in my mind, the various publishing communities have brought it on themselves. If they could be trusted, we wouldn't need Rights and Reproductions departments. My question is, who would have thought the librarians (et al.) were OUR enemies (and yes, I am a librarian myself). It's amazing that we have to regulate access to artworks just to make sure someone will reproduce an image within acceptable limits, and get the identity of the piece correct. God forbid if we tried to make sure the content of the scholarship was accurate even within the broadest of measures.

My advice is, that if you want to see a relaxation of rights and reproductions regulations, self-examination (not you personally, Maryly) is the key. I'd be more than happy *not* to be an R&R officer. There are so many more useful things I can do with my time.

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Kevin J. Comerford                      |   internet: czbb020[_at_]access.texas.gov
Rights & Reproductions Officer,         |
Visual Resource Librarian and           |      
Director of Information Technology      |        aol: DalMuseum
Dallas Museum of Art                    | compuserve: 71233,2412
1717 North Harwood                      |      voice: 214-922-1281
Dallas, TX 75201                        |        fax: 214-954-0174

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Received on Thu Mar 17 1994 - 05:23:37 GMT