What is Original Work, and What is Fair Use?

Minnesota Statehood Quilt Top

Here’s MG’s fracture quilt top put together and with an added border.

Moroccan Mosque Quilt, Completed

Here’s MN’s fracture quilt, completed.  (Sorry about the less than terrific angles on the photos)

Of course, you may have seen previous versions of these, but not in this state.  These quilts were made based on original drawings, simplifications of  photographs.  We, as  a group, used photographs that were in the public domain, or with the permission of the photographer (as in MN’s daughter, J, in the case of the one above).

Given the current action by the AP, this brings up a few important questions about art, original works, and “fair use” of copyrighted materials.

Our Friendship Circle used photographs for the basis of our quilts.  All of us have done the following things to protect the copyright of the original photographer, and separate our works from them:

1. made our quilts for our personal use and display at home (no threat to the original photographer’s rights to benefit monetarily  from his/her images)
2. made original drawings (simplifications) based on, but not exact copies of the photos
3. cut the drawings apart and gave them to group members to create original works in fabric (the individual fracture pieces)
4. combined the original  fabric works (fracture pieces) together
5. added more design elements (borders, quilting, details)

Note that I AM NOT A LAWYER,  but I believe it is reasonable to say that the photographs were original inspirations, but that the finished quilts are significantly different from the original works (i.e. quilts of fabric, not photographs, and there are many different steps of original work and interpretation that separate our works from the original photographs), and that there would not be any mistaking that the original photographer’s work is much different from ours.

We did our best to protect ourselves from situations like what the Associated Press is in with Shepard Fairey.

Why am I blogging about copyright issues and quilts?  Because of something of local significance.  Minnesota has been celebrating its sesquicentennial (150 years of statehood), and the bridge in the image of the Minnesota statehood stamp is the one that goes from our town across the Mississippi to Wisconsin.  So, this bridge, and the river around it, now has some local historical significance.  Did I mention that the quilter’s guild we belong to was started by the Winona County Historical Society?  And that we meet at their building?

As it happens, someone at the Historical Society suggested that it would be really cool if the guild would make a quilt for display in the Historical Society based on the Minnesota Sesquicentennial Stamp.

This would be cool, for lots of reasons.  It represents the Winona County Historical Society’s appreciation of quilts.  The general image represented would be about Winona County and its relationship to the Mississippi River, and the regional landscape.  If we made a quilt that looked like the stamp, it would also represent the significance of the Sesquicentennial, and a view of Winona on the national stage.

But now we need to be more careful, since any potential quilt we might make for the Historical Society would be a quilt displayed publicly, not for the pleasure of an individual quilter.  And now,  it makes copyright a valid concern.  And the last thing we’d want to do is to have the Winona County Historical Society, which does a lot for the quilt guild, to be sued for violating copyright.

I sent an email to the press contact for the Minnesota Statehood Stamp from the USPS.  Below is my text.  We’ll see what happens.

Mr. Nowacki -

Thank you for taking the time to read my email.

I am the President of the Winona Area Quilter’s Guild, in Winona, Minnesota.  We meet at the Winona County Historical Society, which founded our organization long before I was involved with it.

Someone at the Winona County Historical Society approached a guild member and asked if we could make a quilt for display in the Historical Society based on the Minnesota Statehood Stamp, to commemorate the local significance of the image, and to represent the Sesquicentennial.

We have not done anything so far but listen to the request, and wonder about the copyright issues associated with doing so, as this would be a quilt for display in the Historical Society.

Given the current action that the Associated Press is taking against an artist who made Obama images based on a photograph an AP employee took, we want to make sure that we could ask for appropriate permissions to make a derivative work based on the stamp image.

My question for you, sir, is how would we go about requesting the permission?  Would we need permission not only from the USPS, but also from Mr. Richard Hamilton Smith, who took the photo?  And also Ethan Kessler, who designed the stamp?

Please let me know if you can point me in the correct direction for us to ask for that permission.

Thank you,

Jennifer Sanborn
President, Winona Area Quilter’s Guild

Now I’ll see if I can send some similar requests for permission to the photographer, and the stamp designer, and see what happens.

Stay tuned….