Our city learned exactly that in relation to public art. A vehicle hit a metal sculpture that had been installed in a street median. The artist claimed that the city couldn’t make repairs and re-install it, that he had to be hired at hefty rates to “preserve the integrity” of the piece.
I’m not sure how things were decided, but all of the engineers and project managers in the city got legal language to be added to any future contract that included providing and/or installing public art.
I’m not officially a “creative” but part of my job includes writing documents and designing stuff (from document formats to small programs). My contracts always indicate that intellectual ownership belongs to the end client: not to me, not to my agent, not to any consulting firms involved. Whether I’m officially allowed to retain copies of such documents or not is generally understood and sometimes spelled out to follow internal policies: any content the client considers exclusive when produced by an internal worker is exclusive when produced by me, same for confidential, same for “feel free to diseminate and reuse, giving proper credit”.
Note that any design I make, I can always re-create; being allowed to keep copies can make the drudgy parts of the job easier when it involves looking up a bunch of field names and technical values, but when it comes to training manuals I always start from scratch and when it’s processes, what, you wanna keep my brain? Sorry, not legal!
I know for the engineers and other science disciplines where I worked, they had the “whatever you come up with is ours” rule, even if you did things in your spare time, if there was even the remotest connection to what you worked on. (After all if you are hired as a chemical engineer, or mechanical engineer, odds are anything patentable from you will be in your field of expertise) One of the lowly lab techs invented something and got moderately rich off it, and since they did not extend the courtesy of such agreement to his employment category, and it was not directly related to his work (he was a tinkerer at home) he kept it. Funny thing, this was back in the days of COBOL, they did not feel this condition needed to be applied to the IT department.
Knowing the appearance of most street art I’d attempted to remove it saying, “Sorry your giant paperclip got banged up. You have thirty days to get it out of our storage yard or storage fees will apply.”
That might have cost them a lot of money. The Visual Artists Rights Act of 1990 gives the creator of certain works (and public sculptures are very likely to qualify) the right of integrity – the right to prevent distortion, modification, or mutilation, or (for works of recognized stature) intentional or negligent destruction.
But is the recipient/hosting city obliged to maintain the artwork? Presumably deterioration, vandalism, accidents etc. happen and the city owes no obligation to actively maintain a work of art. They do so out of concern for the appearance of their city, and if an artist vetoes their proposed maintenance then the onus falls to the artist to persuade the city to pay for his choice of maintenance.
The act I presume does not prevent the city from deciding to remove a work of art, to stop displaying it or change venue.
(Recall the big to-do about the bull, and then about the little girl and the bull, down by Wall St. )
Natural deterioration isn’t actionable. However, failure to take reasonable steps to protect a work might trigger the intentional or negligent destruction provision for notable works. Preservation is allowed, unless it is done with gross negligence.
They have to give the artist adequate notice and an opportunity to remove it emself.
^Exactly^ Give it back to the artist and buy a new one, maybe with some bollards around it this time.
I don’t think bollards would improve things. They’d be a visual distraction and could be a liability.
Any artist who is passionately attached to their metal sculpture shouldn’t agree to have it installed in a street median. Although that makes it slightly less likely to be hit by graffiti.
This is a silly standard. And it reflects a level of disregard and disrespect for creators.
You might as well say that if a municipality or a corporation doesn’t value the integrity of artists’ work, they shouldn’t seek to display art.
Municipalities and corporations often want quality public art for the prestige and other factors. Artists often like it for the same reasons. In many cases that one piece of public art might be that artist’s most important work.
If no one was getting anything out of these arrangements then they wouldn’t do them in the first place.
Copyright and moral rights laws like VARA attempt to achieve a balance, especially given that the vast majority of artists don’t have the means to (1) forego opportunities or (2) move and store giant things at the top of a hat. Artists’ Rights fo a small way towards giving the artist some leverage.
And that’s also one of the reasons that contract law exists—people are giving up something in return for getting something.
Reported.
I’m not really sure which “standard” you’re referring to. To acknowledging that things in street medians tend to eventually be hit by cars?
The standard being the one regarding how the liability for that risk should be allocated. It shouldn’t be “artists who are serious should just not allow their works to be used.” Their works should be used, and the liability should be allocated in a way that the burden doesn’t fall entirely on the artist. Remember, the entity putting the work there could just refuse to use artistic works. So there should be shared liability in the case of damage.
The liability associated with bollards is that they stop a car more abruptly than a tree or art work would and therefore are more likely to cause injury. The artist has no part of that liability. Whichever entity is in charge of the street, not the artist, would be deciding whether to install bollards, so the entity would have the full liability.
And given that they might choose to reduce their liability in that respect by foregoing bollards, it’s fair that the risk to the sculpture increased by the absence of bollards be shared, with the municipality bearing a larger burden than the artist. The various burdens of liability should slide up and down according to the bollard factor and others, including the comparative ability of a municipal corporation versus an individual artist to bear such burdens.
It’s fair that these burdens be comparatively allocated. As I said, cities don’t have to install public art. If they think that public art is garnering the city some benefit, it’s fair to make them bear more of the burden of the risks of damage.
Allocating burdens risk isn’t about ensuring that the risk is zero. It’s about sharing the liability fairly.
And one of those ways is by contract. If an artist has a contract that restrict how repairs will be made then that’s the way the cookie crumbles.
You say “it’s fair that the risk to the sculpture increased by the absence of bollards be shared”. I have no idea what that means.
The risk to the sculpture is that it will be hit by the car.
As a result of the collision, the artist is on the hook for nothing. The artist will not be sued whether there are bollards there or not.
As a result of damage to the piece of public art due to the collision, the artist is on the hook for nothing. The city (or other agency) will pay for any repairs. Or the city (ooa) will pay to remove the remains.
The only thing under discussion is whether the city is required to pay the artist to make the repairs, or whether they can use their own or a hired crew. That’s not a risk. That’s either part of the contract or it’s not. And if the most likely damage is that the attachment pole is bent and needs to be replaced and reset into a new foundation, then the city’s going to want the option to use their own crew.
If the city wants a replacement, whether they have to purchase it from the artist might also be part of the contract. Even if the city completely bought the design, the original artist probably has an advantage in negotiating to provide the replacement.
I understand that improper repairs can be thought to impinge on the artist’s creative integrity. But this is still a metal object that’s been installed in a street median. The city does not want a bad repair (can you say public ridicule?) but they also don’t want to pay through the nose for easy repairs.
Plus, what happens when the artist dies? Is he supposed to leave behind a company whose purpose is to keep his sculptures up to snuff forever and ever amen? Will they also handle periodic cleaning or is that left to the cities?