It can be very difficult to track down the copyright owner, especially if the owner has died or the original creator has assigned the copyright to another party. However, not being able to locate a copyright owner is not an excuse (ethically or legally) for infringing someone’s copyright. Following are some steps you can take to track down a copyright owner.
- Firstly, you need to determine whether the work is still in copyright ie, the artist is still alive or it has been less than 70 years since their death. If the creator of the work has been dead for 70 years or more and you intend only to distribute the work in Australia, then the work is in the "public domain" and free to use.
- If the work is still in copyright:
• contact a copyright society (like Viscopy or CAL - Copyright Agency Limited) to see if they represent the artist
• if not, check if the work or other works by the artist are in the collection of a regional or state/national gallery or museum
• if the work is in a publication contact the publisher
• use the web by doing a search on the artist’s name. Visual Arts Net has a search directory of artists as does the website www.ARTnewsroom.com. Both sites allow you to search on selected artists’ names. There are also artists listed on the Australian Commercial Galleries Association website.
• see the Australian Copyright Council's guideline on finding copyright owners. They have some contacts for well known copyright holders such as Disney. They have an information sheet called Owners of copyright: how to find
• the NSW State Library and the National Library of Australia have large image databases
• contact a photo researcher (someone whose job it is to track down copyright owners) They can be sourced from the Yellow Pages telephone directory.
