For today’s Needled News, I’m going to put on my lawyer hat. Just envision me in a kicky beret as I spout my personal opinion on a legal issue surrounding some tattoo news of the past week.

It’s about copyright. Those who read my Needled blog regularly are now letting out a universal groan and group eye rolling. It’s because I talk about it a lot. It’s my thang, as we say in the legal world.

For those not in the know, I first brought up the issue of copyright and tattoos in 2003 in an article for BMEzine. It made people really uncomfortable and made me really unpopular.

Lawyers in the tattoo world. Heaven forfend!

But when I wrote it, I was largely looking at how tattooists can assert their rights against companies and individuals who appropriate their designs for commercial use. A minor example of this is when an “author” used photos of tattoos from the portfolios of my husband and friends in an e-book without permission and in a derogatory way.

Another perfect example came up this past week. One of my favorite blogs, Counterfeit Chic, wrote about new tattooed tees that raise copyright concerns:

[These cotton tees cost $58 at Kitson. Chic, maybe. Cheap, no.]

CC editor, Professor Susan Scafidi, goes on to note that Beck’s and his tattoo artist may have legal claims here. She links an old Needled post of mine entitled David Beckham's Tattoo Copyright Controversy where I wrote about UK tattoo artist Louis Malloy—the man who designed and inked Beckham’s back tattoos—threatening to sue the soccer star and his Posh wife for not crediting nor compensating him in a promotional campaign highlighting their body art. As Susan rightly states, Malloy could have a claim against the tee designer if he hasn’t assigned his rights in the tattoo designs to Beckham. And Beckham himself may also have a claim in rights of publicity under California law, his new home. [For more on celebrities, marketing, and tattoos, see my Celebs Beware the Ink.]

This type of tattoo copyright case is one that many tattooists would get behind. The real controversy is whether tattooers should be suing each other over stolen custom design work. Now, I’ve had my custom tattoos copied. It sucks. It’s not flattery. My sleeves and backpiece are decorative and pretty, but they also mark my own history, family, travels and were designed and needled by someone I love, my husband. The designs took months to create in collaboration. For another “artist” to rip them off identically, making an easy buck, is disturbing to me.

A bunch of Suicide Girls, most notably Amina who registered her chestpiece with the US Copyright Office, have had their custom artwork stolen as well.



When asked about how he felt over the theft, Amina’s tattooer Tim Kern, aka ymonster, said in an email:

I’m specifically using this quote from Tim because often when I mention potentially suing tattooers who have ripped off my husband’s large custom works, someone will say “Paul Booth gets ripped off all the time and he doesn’t sue.” So I asked Paul directly, why not sue? He said that he just doesn’t have the time, although he did note that if he were married to a tattooed lawyer who’d take up the fight, he would consider it.

For now, however, I’ve decided not to take up the fight in court. I’ve had a number of opportunities to create a test case on tattoo copyright but it would have been impractical. Indeed, it would take up a good deal of time and money, and most importantly, there would be some kind of backlash in the tattoo community because many artists are quite divided and have strong opinions on the issue. Believe, I save the emails. One of them goes like this:

That one’s hanging up on my bulletin board.

It’s true. I don’t tattoo, and as the saying goes, those who cannot do, blog. So I do not seek vengeance for copyright violations in the courts. I seek it out on the Internet.

Over the past year and a half, I have posted a number of custom design theft stories on Needled. Here, today, I’m posting a link to a studio whose artist(s) may just be too lazy to tattoo even copied designs, so they've taken photos from other tattoo artists around the world to fill their online galleries. I guess my Greek brothers and sisters at Bar Code Tattoo in Athens didn’t think I’d learn of them taking the photo (in gallery 2) of a large African-inspired backpiece my husband did and putting it on their site as their own work. Let’s play a game and see if we can match the rest of the tattoo photos with other artists.

In tribute to Bar Code Tattoo, I have decided to name all those who violate tattoo copyright, what we call in Greek, malakas.


I’d love to hear your opinion on the issue in the comment forum below. I get A LOT of messages re: tattoo copyright, so please read my articles before you ask any questions; they tend to answer most you may have.


Marisa_DiMattia is a lawyer and editor of Needled.com, a blog on tattoo art and culture. She is currently co-editing a book on new issues in copyright and p2p file sharing, which will be out next year.