Copyright and art

[Ylva]

Blockchain company buys and burns Banksy artwork to turn it into a digital original

A Banksy piece called "Morons (White)" was intentionally destroyed, then digitized as a non-fungible token, or NFT.

www.cbsnews.com

I am just wondering if this is legal. Here we are, framers, educating our customers about not altering artwork as it is protected under copyright.
So how can this not be?

I also don't understand nft. But if that produces a 'copy' wouldn't that also fall under copyright?

 

[wpfay]

At that point it might kwalify as derivative and be outside the copyright laws. The original is no longer extant and the derivative art is no longer by Banksy.
Hoping karma comes along and the effort is a total flop, but someone did buy a banana duct taped to the wall, so who knows.

I'm buying some work for a client by a known forger of pop art. They are direct rips from Warhol's flower series, but the forger evaded the copyright laws by titling each "After Warhol...".

 

[JFeig]

It is too early to have any legal "test cases" clarify the situation regarding NFT's.

It's P.T. Barnum laughing all the way to the bank again!

 

[Ylva]

And the follow up, the sold NFT

Burnt Banksy NFT Sells for $380K in ETH

A Banksy piece bought by a group of crypto-savvy artists, burned in a park and memorialized as an NFT has sold for 228.69 ETH.

finance.yahoo.com

So they made a nice profit on what is essentially a copy.

 

[Matthew Hale]

Beeple sold an NFT for $69 million

 

[Ylva]

I just saw that this morning. It is completely mind baffling, isn't it? I saw he worked 13 years on that one, not planning to sell it really. Opening bid started at $100 LOL!