Insights

On October 24, 2024, the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) handed down its highly anticipated ruling in the Kwantum v. Vitra case (C-227/23). In short, the CJEU held that EU Member States must afford copyright protection for works of applied art (i.e., furniture, lighting, home appliances, etc.) that meet the originality-requirement, regardless of the country of origin of these works or the nationality of the author.

The United States Supreme Court has decided to revisit the copyright doctrine of fair use in Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc. v. Goldsmith. The case involves a collection of Warhol’s silkscreen prints and pencil illustrations based on Lynn Goldsmith’s copyrighted photograph of the artist Prince. The Warhol illustration was originally commissioned by Vanity Fair magazine in 1984, but Warhol later created his own series of artwork based on the photograph, which Goldsmith argued was an infringement of her copyright. The Warhol Foundation responded by invoking the fair use defense. The Second Circuit decided that the Warhol works did not constitute fair use of the photograph, concluding that all four of the factors in the fair use test favored Goldsmith.[1]

In a recently released ruling (of June 25th), the Belgian Supreme Court confirmed a decision of the Court of Appeal of Ghent relating to the possibility of copyright protection for lawyers’ work product created within the framework of their professional activity.