Q&A: Copyright question; reproducing photo into art…?

Question by artnerd: Copyright question; reproducing photo into art…?
I recently completed an artpiece for a friend, and I thought about selling prints of the piece. However, I worry about copyright law, and was wondering if anyone had experience with this.

The artpiece is based on a copyrighted photograph of a musician. I took the photograph, and made a larger, stippled painting of it. I asked my gallery chairman if I could enter it in the next show, and he said no, because it is based on a copyrighted image.

My question is this: How do those artists you find in mall kiosks who are selling graphite renderings of celebrities get around the copyright? Many of those prints are from famous photos. Also, at many art fairs, I have seen vendors/artists selling an original piece of an actor in his/her most famous role, and the entire image is drawn by writing out the respective movie script in different colors of ink,, thereby producing an image of the actor in that movie. Are these people getting around copyright laws, or are they just getting lucky?
I could not access the Harpers article without subscribing, but managed to find bits of it on other websites. It’s a good article, but still left me with questions. Thanks, though!

Best answer:

Answer by Veritat
A great article from Harper’s Magazine (NOT Harper’s Bazaar), of February 2007, p53 deals with this issue. Its title is On the Rights of Molotov Man, Appropriation and the art of context, by Joy Garnett (painter) and Susan Meiselas (photographer).

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