Category: Photography

Instagram rip-offs by Richard Prince show why we need a small claims copyright court now

Ripping off artists in the name of ART is not OK

How long are we going to continue to let small artists get screwed by those with deep pockets?  Talk to any small creator–filmmakers, musicians, photographers, artists, authors–and ask whether they’ve had their work stolen (and monetized) by others and most will likely say “yes.”  Then ask them what they did about it.  The answer will likely be, “nothing.”

Right now a con-artist named Richard Prince is busy raking in the dough by selling Instagram photographs taken by others.   Oh yeah, he adds some drivel and emojis to the bottom of each photo before he blows it up a 65 x 48 print.  Yes art is often derivative, and yes these photographs are altered–but, in essence, at its core, the art remains a photograph taken (and owned) by someone else.

Prince, and the Gagosian Gallery where his work was shown, apparently have no qualms about blatantly appropriating and cashing by selling the work of other artists without their permission.  As a Paddy Johnson noted so succinctly in a piece he wrote for Artnet News, “Richard Prince sucks.”

So, while there’s no doubt Prince is a phony, piggy-backing off the work of Instagram artists; the question is–returning to my original query–Can the photographers whose pictures were stolen do anything to stop Prince’s outrageous fraud?  Well, not really. You see, quite simply,  Mr. Prince is loaded and the people he steals from are not.

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