Victor Lynn Goldsmith risked financial ruin to defend her copyrights of a 1981 photograph of the late musician Prince.
Speaking from her primary residence in Nashville on Friday, the 75-year-old said she had not been confident that SCOTUS would decide in her favor.
With her lawsuit, the aim was to tighten up fair use or transformative aspects of the law. “It doesn’t mean that an artist isn’t influenced by another artist’s work. But if you are going to take something, take what is in the public domain or if it’s copywritten, ask permission. It’s that simple, unless it’s for educational purposes or other select circumstances [protected] under the copyright law.
Goldsmith, who had been assigned by Newsweek to shoot the then up-and-coming performer in 1981, owns the copyrights to the portrait. After the AWF licensed an image of Warhol’s “Orange Prince” to Condé Nast for publication in itsPrior to that, in 1984, Goldsmith had licensed the use of her 1981 photo to.
“I worked really hard to have the trust, much less the equipment, the studio, the assistants to create what I created. In celebrity portriature, trust is key to your success or failure. If they see your image on a T-shirt, they think you licensed it when you didn’t. Then you have to spend time tracking it down to show them you didn’t do it. Or if you don’t know they are angry about something you didn’t do, you just know they never hire you again,” she said.
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