The Supreme Court of the United States agreed to consider the application of the fair use doctrine as it relates to transformative works. The Andy Warhol Foundation v. Goldsmith, Case No. 21-869 (Supr. Ct. Mar. 28, 2022) (certiorari granted).
In a case touching the estates of two of the world’s best-known artists, the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit held that a series of prints and illustrations of the musical artist Prince created by the visual artist Andy Warhol were substantially similar to a 1981 portrait photograph of Prince taken by the photographer Lynn Goldsmith. The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc. v. Lynn Goldsmith, et al., Case No. 19-2420-cv (2d Cir. Mar. 26, 2021) (Lynch, J.) (Sullivan, J., joined by Jacobs, J., concurring) (Jacobs, J., concurring). The Andy Warhol Foundation petitioned the Supreme Court for review of the decision.
The question presented is as follows:
Whether a work of art is “transformative” when it conveys a different meaning or message from its source material (as this Court, the Ninth Circuit, and other courts of appeals have held), or whether a court is forbidden from considering the meaning of the accused work where it “recognizably deriv[es] from” its source material (as the Second Circuit has held).
