Sedlik additional claims that Von D, who owns Excessive Voltage Tattoo in Los Angeles, didn’t request or obtain a license to breed his work. Von D posted an image that confirmed her copying Sedlik’s image and tattooing it onto a person’s shoulder on Mar. 18, 2017 on her private Instagram account, the place she has over 7 million followers.
Von D captioned the publish, “Can’t consider that is the primary time I’ve gotten to tattoo a portrait of #MilesDavis! [thank you, Blake for letting me tattoo you!].” Von D additionally posted a video of the session on You Tube.
“The caption additionally ‘tags’ defendant Excessive Voltage Tattoo with its Instagram username @highvoltageat for the aim of selling and soliciting gross sales of services and products provided by Excessive Voltage Tattoo,” the criticism reads, noting that the tattoo store at present boasts practically 1 million followers on the social media platform.
Sedlik is asking that the courtroom order the defendants to take away content material referencing the picture from all print, net and social media platforms managed by Von D and/or Excessive Voltage Tattoo, whereas additionally enjoining them from any additional use of the picture. He’s moreover requesting statutory damages of $150,000 per work depicting the tattoo, together with “spinoff works” comparable to promoting, advertising and marketing and promotional supplies; income the defendants created from their use of the picture and losses incurred by Sedlik from that use; “every other financial benefit gained” by the defendants in an quantity to be decided at trial; all different damages obtainable underneath copyright legislation; attorneys’ charges and prices of the swimsuit; and pre- and post-judgment curiosity.
In a prolonged assertion to Billboard, Sedlik stated the next: “Plaintiff Jeffrey Sedlik reached out to Kat Von D ‘artist to artist’ (by means of her representatives) searching for an amicable decision of the matter previous to submitting swimsuit, however Ms. Von Drachenberg selected to disregard Mr. Sedlik’s good religion effort to keep away from litigation. Because the holder of a legitimate copyright within the Iconic Miles Davis Portrait, Mr. Sedlik has the only and unique proper of copy, publication and the creation of spinoff works.
“As an artist herself, Ms. Von Drachenberg is properly conscious that creators like Mr. Sedlik depend on income acquired for using their artistic endeavors to assist themselves and their households. Regrettably, Ms. Von Drachenberg selected to not contact Mr. Sedlik prior to creating the quite a few unauthorized reproductions and spinoff works of his Iconic Miles Davis Portrait as described within the criticism.
“Ms. Von Drachenberg not solely used Mr. Sedlik’s {photograph} with out permission or license, however took credit score for Mr. Sedlik’s creation as her personal, distributing pictures of her illegal derivate work to tens of millions of social media followers, and supplying these pictures to publishers for inclusion of promotional editorials about Ms. Von Drachenberg and her varied industrial ventures.”
“Ms. Von Drachenberg did not respect the inventive work of a fellow artist, and selected to monetize Mr. Sedlik’s iconic {photograph} for her private monetary achieve, exploiting the worth of Mr. Sedlik’s {photograph} to construct her model and to advertise the sale of her services and products.”
Von D has not responded to Billboard‘s request for remark.
