Accused of ripping off my own ripped off art....
A few weeks ago I got a mysterious comment on my blog, accusing me of ripping off my 2009 Dia de Los Muertos poster from a pair of Mexican artists.
I attempted to find some art by these artists online, but couldn't. Google didn't even turn up results for their names. I attempted to contact the accuser, but he or she had left a fake email address. I chalked it up to asshattery and forgot about it.
Today one of my local friends sent me a link to the Yelp page of La Condesa taco shop in Phoenix, AZ, and all became clear.
(And the painting on the far left is ripped off of another Bay Area artist, Sylvia Ji.)
Apparently, the owner got this artwork from Mexican artists Manuel Gilavalos y Garcia and Ricardo Ramirez, who can only copy other people's works. Someone saw the paintings, then saw my poster art online, and assumed I copied the painting.
The thing is, though, the restaurant opened and started displaying the paintings in January 2010. (I called them to confirm.) I created the poster artwork in September 2009. So which one obviously came first?
Kinda irks me, because the art is one of the things that's particularly being praised about the restaurant.
I attempted to find some art by these artists online, but couldn't. Google didn't even turn up results for their names. I attempted to contact the accuser, but he or she had left a fake email address. I chalked it up to asshattery and forgot about it.
Today one of my local friends sent me a link to the Yelp page of La Condesa taco shop in Phoenix, AZ, and all became clear.
(And the painting on the far left is ripped off of another Bay Area artist, Sylvia Ji.)
Apparently, the owner got this artwork from Mexican artists Manuel Gilavalos y Garcia and Ricardo Ramirez, who can only copy other people's works. Someone saw the paintings, then saw my poster art online, and assumed I copied the painting.
The thing is, though, the restaurant opened and started displaying the paintings in January 2010. (I called them to confirm.) I created the poster artwork in September 2009. So which one obviously came first?
Kinda irks me, because the art is one of the things that's particularly being praised about the restaurant.