In a court filing, Vivienne Westwood Limited has responded to the legal complaint made by three street artists that claim the designer label and Farfetch sold apparel imprinted with their artwork.
Earlier this year, the graffiti specialists’ complaint claimed that the British designer’s company “inexplicably, and without notice, let alone consent, prominently splashed the artists’ work across their apparel in a transparent effort to lend credibility and an aura of urban cool to their apparel by co-opting the plaintiffs’ special combination of graffiti style and street art.” The artists are seeking a juried trial and an unspecified amount in damages.
In Westwood’s 14-page response, which was submitted Wednesday in the U.S. District Court in the Central District of California, Vivienne Westwood Limited, Latimo SA (an Italian arm of the company) and Vivienne Westwood Srl said they lack sufficient information to admit or deny the allegations and, therefore, those allegations are denied.
The Vivienne Westwood defendants deny that they have committed any acts that violate any law. The parties noted that the apparel in question does not contain any copyright management information that is protected under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. The legal battle is based on the outdoor street art that the artists claim was used by Westwood’s company without their permission.
Jeffrey Gluck, an attorney for the three artists, said Friday that the response was “especially disappointing coming from Vivienne Westwood, who has built an entire brand and aesthetic on the backs of countercultures and rebels. To now allegedly threaten to erode the legal protection for an entire community of artists, instead of simply paying them for using their artwork, is pathetic,” Gluck said. “The global graffiti community is not new to this fight, and they will stand up for their rights now just as they always have in the face of unjust corporate exploitation.”
Gluck suggested that a fashion label had not made a similar defense since years-old copyright dispute between the street artist Revok and H&M over one of the Swedish conglomerate’s advertising campaigns. In 2018, a settlement was reportedly reached that included H&M agreeing to fund a handful of Detroit art institutions and charities.
