A Luxembourg court has ruled in favour of U.S. photographer Jingna Zhang, overturning a 2022 decision that had initially sided with painter Jeff Dieschburg, who was accused of copying Zhang’s photograph. The court ordered Dieschburg to cease exhibiting his painting “Turandot,” derived from Zhang’s 2017 photo for Harper’s Bazaar Vietnam, or face daily fines of €1,000, up to a maximum of €100,000.
The ruling has been hailed as a victory for artists’ rights, particularly in the age of AI. “This win means a lot – not just for me but also for artists and photographers everywhere,” Zhang wrote on X, formerly Twitter. “It’s a reminder that copyright protects individuals from those that try to profit off our work without consent. It reaffirms that our work being online doesn’t mean we give up our rights.”
Zhang’s victory follows a tumultuous legal battle, during which she faced significant online harassment, including doxxing and racist abuse. “My home address was doxxed, I was told they’d put me in jail, that I’d kill myself soon,” she revealed. “I lost out on work because of how it ate away at me. But I didn’t want to give up.”
Dieschburg, who won the 11th Biennale of Contemporary Art award with “Turandot,” had argued that his use of Zhang’s photograph as a reference was permissible for a figurative painter. However, the court determined that his painting constituted a copyright infringement, regardless of the medium used or the photograph’s online availability.
This landmark decision comes as Zhang also takes on tech giant Google, filing a lawsuit against them for allegedly using her copyrighted works to train their AI image generator, Imagen. The case underscores the growing concerns about copyright protection in the digital age and the potential misuse of artists’ work by AI technologies.
