Copy Kat: An English take on the Miles Davis tattoo

Had the photographer sued tattooist Kat Von D in England he may have succeeded—but that still leaves the problem of enforcing an injunction. Tom Moore of Bird & Bird gets under the skin of an unusual case.  

From Alice in Wonderland to Homer Simpson, tattoos of copyrighted characters are commonplace, and tattoo artists generally don’t seek a licence from the relevant rightsholder. In turn, rightsholders have generally left artists alone, presumably because it would uneconomical and potentially reputationally damaging to be suing them over their tattoos.

However, a recent US case involving a high profile celebrity tattoo artist has challenged this industry norm.

The US case

Katherine von Drachenberg—professionally known as ‘Kat Von D’—is a famous tattoo artist. She featured on the reality show LA Ink, has given tattoos to Miley Cyrus and Lady Gaga and has almost 10 million Instagram followers.

In 2017, Von D tattooed a friend’s arm with an image of jazz artist Miles Davis which was based on a well-known photograph taken by photographer Jeffrey Sedlik and published in JAZZIZ magazine in 1989.

There was no dispute that Von D had used the photograph as a reference for the tattoo, as Von D had posted a photo on her Instagram of her working on the tattoo with Sedlik’s photograph in the background.