Re: Copyright of laws

From: Paul Jones <pjones[_at_]mento.oit.unc.edu>
Date: Thu, 8 Dec 1994 21:23:02 -0500 (EST)

On Thu, 8 Dec 1994, Terry Wolfe wrote:
> On Mon, 5 Dec 1994, Vance R. Koven wrote:
> > In the US I'd say
> > that the First Amendment, which is implicated in parody, would trump
> > moral rights (even though as part now of the Copyright Act you could
> > say moral rights have independent Constitutional support).
>
> This part of your post reminds me of a question I came upon to annoy a
> friend of mine who's a copyright expert and a big advocate of moral
> rights:
>
> I'm an artist. I want to stage some performance art I'll call "Shredded
> Picasso." I acquire an original, rent a hall, get my ginsu, and I'm all
> set to go. Will VARA enable Paloma (or whoever) to stop me? If so,
> what of the First Amendment?

In a pre-VARA world, something like this actually happened. Ed Rauschenburg (sp) bought a Dekunning (again sp) charcoal or sketch and erased it. Then he presented the paper (as erased) as his own work of art. The big question at the time was: who's work of art is it? Ed R's point was that all art (and literature and music) is built as a reaction to and recreation of the works that went before it.

---

Paul Jones Paul_Jones[_at_]unc.edu voice:(919) 962-6501 fax:(919) 962-5664

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<a href="http://sunsite.unc.edu/pjones/"> My other office has a window </a> Received on Fri Dec 09 1994 - 02:25:57 GMT