When Andy Warhol drew that famous painting of the Campbell’s soup can, wasn’t he committing an egregious act of intellectual property theft? After all, the Campbell’s soup can logo is trademarked & owned by Campbell’s, is it not? Did Campbell’s ever sue to recoup damages?
I can’t imagine that Campbell’s would even have a reasonable case for trademark. Warhol was clearly not attempting to sell Campbell’s Soup or a competing product that would infringe on Campbell’s intellectual property interests. There would also have been an obvious First Amendment issue in attempting to sue Warhol for a clearly artistic use of the Campbell’s logo.
Lawyers? Help?
After a brief period of WTF, Campbell’s decided it loved Andy Warhol. It meant that Campbell’s was an icon of American life. Whatever else Warhol was, he had his finger on the pulse of America.
–Nott
The best I could do was this message from a mailing list that has the “official” position from the Andy Warhol Foundation:
I think it is worth noting that a critical piece of any lawsuit is proving damages. That is how you collect your settlement. So, even if Campbells sued Warhol and (for arguments sake) won it would gain Campbells nothing. The court would essentially say that Warhol improperly used Campbell’s trademark and likely made them money than lost them money. Given that they can now go home content in the knowledge of a moral victory that cost them $100,000 in attorney fees and probably a boatload of bad press. Whoopee… I’m not positive but I think most courts would toss the case long before it got to that point if the plaintiff couldn’t show any actual damage in early legal procedures (maybe a real attorney will come by and enlighten us because IANAL).
If anything, Campbells should PAY Warhol (or his estate) for the excellent advertizing he provided…