So in this lecture, we're going to talk about VARA, the Visual Artists Rights Act and Moral Rights. So in 1990, section 106A was added to the U.S. Copyright Law to provide additional protection of moral rights of attribution and integrity to artists. These additional rights include the right to claim authorship of a work and to prevent the use of his or her name as the author of a work of visual art that he or she didn't create. In addition, there is the right to prevent the use of his or her name as the author of a work of visual art in the event of distortion, mutilation, or other modification of the work which would be prejudicial to the artist's reputation or honor. And there is the right to prevent any intentional distortion, mutilation, or other modification or grossly negligent destruction of a work. Finally, the right to prevent any destruction of a work of recognized stature and any intentional or grossly negligent destruction of that work is a violation of the right. These rights are conferred upon the artist even when the artist is no longer the copyright owner. And this set of rights will ask for the life of the artist, which is different from the term of copyright for the work. These rights are specific to the artist and they run with the artist's life. If a work is of joint authorship, the right endures until the life of the last surviving artist. The ownership of the moral rights can't be transferred to another but the artists in the U.S. may choose to waive the rights. >> So, VARA is very limited in scope and it really only covers works of visual arts. So those are things that are paintings, sculptures, drawings, prints, and still photographs that are produced specifically for exhibition. And then within this group, it's only single copies, or signed and numbered limited editions of 200 or less that are actually protected. So it's narrow in scope and very narrow as far as things that really are covered. It is intended for those kind of single works. So there, it is not applied to works made for hire or things that are like posters, maps, globes, things that are technical drawings, diagrams, motion pictures, books, or other publications, merchandising or advertising for example. Or anything that's really promotional or is packaging for a material or a container. And so basically, it doesn't cover any work that's not subject also to general copyright protection. So if we wanna take as an example that Kevin is a celebrated artist. And he paints a painting for me and he signs it. And I have it hanging in my living room. He gives it to me as a gift. And because Kevin is so generous, he even transfers copyright to me. So Kevin and I have a bit of a tiff. And I decide that I no longer want Kevin's painting hanging in my living room. I decide instead that I need to place it on my front yard. So I get a post, I put it in my front yard, and being a canvas and painting, of course, the weather begins to deteriorate the work. So while I own the copyright and the painting, because Kevin transferred it to me, Kevin still has moral rights in the painting under VARA, and my destruction of that painting, by negligence, is still actionable. >> Especially since he is an artist of stature. >> He is an artist of stature and some renowned, which will be a surprise to him. So it's worth noting that the moral rights, they're very narrowly defined in U.S. Copyright Law, and are really much more recent, are more widely recognized in Europe and in other jurisdictions. >> Thank you for watching and listening.