Artists Using Doll Likenesses without Crediting [Mijn Schatje discussion]

Can't believe she has the audacity to ask others to credit her! Why haven't official charges been brought up on her yet? Isn't it time?

Heck, I'd offer up the idea that we all use her pics as our FB art without crediting her - but then that's stooping to her level, and we're better than that. Plus, that only gives her more positive publicity.

 

I'm considerably meaner than that. I'd use one of her pieces with extensive credit, and by extensive credit, I mean including 'based on <linked image> by <other artist>'.

 

Heck, if she's gonna be in NY, maybe a bunch of people should go down there with picket signs?

 

I don't know if I'd go with picket signs, but that might be one time I'd be willing to carry one of my dolls with me out on the street. (Depends on when it is. I have been meaning to get up that way for some bead shopping anyway, so it's definitely not out of the realms of possibility to just go and be a simple doll-carrying presence that would make people wonder. May as well let the weird work FOR us for a change, after all, since folks'd notice.)

 

A few weeks ago I contacted the site of 'La Marelle' about Mijn Schatje (she sells her art there in the form of all kind of stuff) and I provided them with a link to radiotrash' evidence page, saying that I hoped they would take it serious.
I haven't heard anything as of yet, and I don't think I will in the near future either.

I really like La Marelle, but this just makes me sad, as they don't seem to care about what tey're actually selling at all.

 

I fell like pointing this out since I noticed it, even the concept of some of her works isn't original..... She's been working on a new piece called "Vanity" and has produced some production pictures of it, but I knew I had seen it before...


"Vanity" in colored vectors.


"Vanity" in Black/white vectored.


The original inspiration, I first saw this piece in a Rpiley's Belive It or Not! Museum, though it is often shown as an optical illusion in both books of the subjects and on websites.

Now, they certainly aren't exact copies by any means, but the overall concept is still very obvious. If she's an independent artist, then why do something that's been done before? It just seems like it would be a waste of her time to bother. *shrug*

 

Mijn's typical work is taking copyrighted company dolls photos and even some owner pictures and then trace vectoring them before adding some color. However, I was pointing out how this particular piece, "Vanity" is a copy of another artist's work. I wouldn't doubt if the doll's face that can be seen is a vector of an owner picture taken without permission, but due to how small it is we can't be certain. Maybe once she finishes this piece it will be easier to identify the head.

This thread is almost entirely about one particular artist who has been using copyrighted company doll pictures that are slightly altered to make thousands of dollars through prints and licensing works.

 

I just found out about all this and I am so sad and so annoyed I would love to make money from being an artist but don't think its a realistic dream, and to find out that people are charging huge amounts of money for traced, stolen images (and she has been for years!) is rather gutting.

Also, she kinda sucks. If I were to do what she does, I could have done it better.

Is there anything I can do in the UK? Or do I have to just watch and grind my teeth?

(*edit* - refering to MS, not Natalie)

 

I remember when it came to light originally about her art theft, and I was surprised this morning to find out she has a whole new show coming up and her website is right back to active. Her work looks the same, so I imagine they're all stolen images again. It makes me sick considering she sells her prints for $1000 + so she is making crazy money off of these!

 

If I recall, there's a DeviantArt comic that talks about an issue similar to this and how "talented" art thieves get away with things only because of their artifical "talent."

It really boils my blood and break my heart when I see things like this. She is a disgrace and insult to artists everywhere. There are true artists that cannot get a (well paying) job and have to spend their lives in mediocre conditions, but still do their own independent works of beauty, and yet here is this... this filth that just simply crops+edits photos of others' works. Not only that, but it's not like these photos and dolls are from some unknown person - they come from a company. Not EVEN a single company, but multiple companies that work hard to sculpt and breathe life into their dolls in order to make a living.

No matter how talented you are or how much percentage you have altered something, plagarism is still plagarism, art theft is still art theft, and crimes are still crimes. If you were going to do something like this, at least put a "based on -so and so company name- 's works" or something. But selling it as well? I wish misfortune upon her <<; [/biasedwhine]
(I apologize for the last bit's harshness; however, those are my true feelings right now.)

 

Schaatje says that her particular Vanity was "inspired by" Charles Gilbert's 1892 print also called Vanity... so it seems that whole "reflections in mirrors looking like a skull and calling it Vanity" thing wasn't an original idea even back then, it seems.
At least she credited that particular inspiration in her blog, if not anywhere else (i.e. in the art's caption/title or the gallery catalogue).

 

It's awful that she did this. Of course it must be tempting for art thieves to use pictures of bjds for "their" art. I mean, are dolls are beautiful! But I HATE when people can't use their own creativity to create artwork.

 

At least when Andy Warhol painted Campbell's Soup cans, he never claimed that he had invented the Campbell's soup can (of course, even then it still created a lot of controversy)...

Using other artworks for inspiration is perfectly fine. Nothing in this world is completely original. But I think you've crossed a line when your work looks like you've actually take someone else's photo into a computer graphics manipulation program and just modifed it until you've barely cleared the legal standards which make it an "original work", then deny ever having seen the photo you ripped it off from.

 

What Shaatje's latest piece of art tells me is that Shaatje refuses to see that to reinterpret an idea, you have to start over and hopefully say something new. Others have successfully reinterpreted the same Gilbert painting she is aping.

Here is the 1892 Charles Gilbert creation:



And here is the Christian Dior company's prize winning homage to it (from 2002):



In the Dior case, the reinterpretation is that it's a photograph staged similarly to the Gilbert drawing-- a model posed carefully so that she and her reflection make the face of a skull. It wasn't easy to do, and it's in a different medium. And it's an effective ad, because so many of us have seen the image it references-- but it's got a twist. Shaatje's is just a crappy redrawing of someone else's painting , not unlike a first grader's tracings. There's nothing new there and nothing new is said.

 

I understand getting inspiration from BJDs but her works looks like she's just be taking the stock picture and tracing over it, then adding some little extras and voila art.

 

I do not support art thieves, I appreciate an ugly picture with a good idea better then a good picture with a stolen idea.
Inspiration on the other hand is something else, but completely use another idea is wrong.
If the person who wants to use a picture are allowed to, that's fine

 

Wow, I have been stalking this thread since I first joined DoA and I see that this is STILL going on. I can't believe that nothing has happened yet to stop this. She obviously just traces photos and doesn't give credit....the proof is so obvious....and yet nothing has happened to stop her yet. And she continues to go on tracing pictures and making a profit. There is a fine line between inspiration and just plain ripping off of something. Tracing over a photo and changing the color or something isn't /inspiration/. I don't see why anyone would think it is. Overlaying a picture on top of a photo and everything matching up /exactly/ isn't /normal/. How the heck is that supposed to happen by chance? Really? Grrr.....it is so scary how she just gets away with this too. Whenever I see her pictures is just plain scares me. Just think how easy it is to get away with art theft on a professional level....is this really the art industry? >>;;; Makes me think twice about posting my stuff online, you know?

She just purely disgusts me. And I never trash talk /anyone/. I hope she gets what is coming to her one day. And I hope she never has her disgusting gallery displaying in my state or anywhere in proximity to me either. (Ehe if she does, I'd love to go near her gallery or outside it and hand out flyers to people with the examples and information. xD *shot for such an evi idea* )

 

...How is she getting away with this? She needs to pay EVERYONE she stole from! I was disgusted when I saw the comparison pictures... It is a blatant copy. Just because she changes the skin color or hair doesn't make that HER work. I cannot understand how or why anyone would side with her. She is stealing and making money off of other people's work and designs. Everyone she stole from deserves some of the money she earned, and I think they should sue her as well.

Inspiration is different from copying. I would understand if she liked the way a doll looked in a picture, then redrew it completely in another pose, etc. But just copying the picture exactly = NO. She is not inspired by these pictures in the way that a legit artist is inspired... She is inspired to just copy it. I read the emails from the website... She acts so innocent and like she isn't aware of what she's doing. I don't know if that's worse than admitting that she is doing something wrong.

 

O__o; Wow, she's still at large for her stealing? How has this not been stopped yet?!

 

I like sculpting the best though I paint too. If someone took one of my sculptures and cast it then repainted it as something different I would be quite upset. It's the same thing. She is taking someone's base and painting over it. I can't believe she is still around. Just sad.