AP Wants Its Due From “Hope” Poster

AP Photo - Mannie Garcia/Shepard Fairey

UPDATE: Shepard Fairey is now suing the AP, claiming he altered the image “with new meaning, new expressions and new messages.”

That ubiquitous “Hope” poster that came to symbolize Barack Obama’s presidential campaign was actually based on an AP photograph by Mannie Garcia. Problem was, the artist, Shepard Fairey, never licensed or paid for the photo and now the AP is crying copyright infringement. Fairey and his lawyers are calling it fair use.

It turns out there were quite a few people working on unraveling this mystery, but most point to Tom Gralish of the Philadelphia Enquirer as connecting the final dots. If you’re interested in how one goes about investigating a poster’s source material, read Gralish’s and blogger James Danziger’s account here and here.

The image will be going in the National Portrait Gallery in Washington. It’s made Fairey very, very famous, if not rich (he claims he’s earned no money from the poster, having donated it to the Obama campaign). But, as a firmly fringe, anti-establishment street artist (well, at least he was before he signed on to design presidential campaign posters), Fairey of all people should recognize the importance of giving artists their due.

Story from The AP

Rally Guards Block NYC Photographer

 

We posted on a pro-Palestinian rally that took place in LA a few weeks back, and there was a similar event in New York City in January. This video shows a credentialed photographer being harassed by event “security guards” (which are actually just civilians in neon vests) and knocked over the head by protesters with signs. The NYPD doesn’t seem to care either.

If you go to 7:07 of the video, a guard/thug starts grabbing the photographer and then forces him far away from the protesters. The guard/thug then lunges at the photographer for no apparent reason other than he’s a hot head on some sort of a retribution mission. NYPD are nowhere to be found. And when they do finally show up, they’re useless.

This is America. Times Square. The photographer has credentials. It’s a public rally. This shouldn’t be happening here. But what’s truly puzzling is that there doesn’t seem to be any downside to letting a photojournalist photograph your event. What are they so worried about?