If you buy a painting, yes, you own the canvas. You can put it wherever you like, rent it out to others, destroy it, dismantle it and cut up the pieces to make your own collage artwork, whatever you like.
The copyright in the work belongs to the artist though. Your physical ownership of the painting doesn’t stop the artist making another work just like it or licensing the right to do so to someone else.
Museums and galleries sometimes claim copyright on images of works they possess, but that’s generally claiming a copyright over that particular photograph of the work, not the work itself. In order to do things like sell prints they will have to license the work from the artist or the current rights holder (for distributing prints of that work in that territory, which might not be the same as the rights holder for other uses).
Ownership of ‘what the painting represents’ isn’t really something the law takes much of a position on.
jameshart|1 year ago
The copyright in the work belongs to the artist though. Your physical ownership of the painting doesn’t stop the artist making another work just like it or licensing the right to do so to someone else.
Museums and galleries sometimes claim copyright on images of works they possess, but that’s generally claiming a copyright over that particular photograph of the work, not the work itself. In order to do things like sell prints they will have to license the work from the artist or the current rights holder (for distributing prints of that work in that territory, which might not be the same as the rights holder for other uses).
Ownership of ‘what the painting represents’ isn’t really something the law takes much of a position on.
cushpush|1 year ago