Our Leonardo stuff
- Leonardo promotion
- Can a signature be registered as a trade mark?
- How long are works of art protected under copyright law?
- Did Leonardo ever patent any of his inventions?
- Can a building be patented or have registered design protection?
- Can medical procedures be patented?
- What is a plant variety right?
How long are works of art protected under copyright law?
Copyright law grants the creators of original works the right to economically exploit their work.
Works that are protected are original works like literary, dramatic, musical, or artistic works, sound recordings and films. Only works that are original are protected, meaning they have been independently created and not copied. As a rule of thumb, ‘sweat of the brow’, skill and labour have to have been employed in the creation.
How does copyright arise? Do you need to register your work?
Copyright arises without the need for a formal registration process. However, the work must be tangible in some form and pure ideas, concepts or plans are not covered. For example, if you have a brilliant idea for a story, it’s not protected until you put it down on paper. Or say, you can already hear the melody of a new song in your mind: unless you record it in some way, say by writing down the notes or recording it on tape, it’s not protected. It’s the expression of ideas that is protected, not the idea itself.
The creator has the right to make copies or reproductions, to import or export the work, and, more importantly, to sell, licence or share these rights with third parties in exchange for compensation.
Copyright is a negative right in that it gives the owner the right to stop people form using a work without consent.
Depending on the jurisdiction and the type of work, the duration of the right differs. In most countries including New Zealand, protection extends to at least 50 years after the creator’s death. However, in recent years this term has been extended to 70 years or more in several jurisdictions.
What does the © sign mean? For example: © Leonardo da Vinci, 1501.
This sign merely indicates that the person who has placed it next to a work claims to be the copyright owner. In other words: in the first place it’s a claim, a warning to anyone that a work is supposedly protected. Whether or not this is the case would have to be decided in a lawsuit. In other words, under today’s legal regime, artists enjoy copyright for their works even if they did not place any copyright notice on their works.
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