Brussels, 02/09/2014 (Agence Europe) - What are the conditions a work must meet to enable it to be described as a “parody” and what are the limits beyond which member states can no longer allow a copyright-protected work to be used without the consent of its creator for the purposes of caricature, parody or pastiche as admitted by the directive on copyright (20012/29/EC)?
It is to these questions, put by the Brussels Court of Appeal, that the Court of Justice of the EU must respond on Wednesday 3 September, in case C-201/13. The Brussels court has been called on to determine if the extreme Right Flemish party, Vlaams Belang, was within its rights to distribute, without the consent of the copyright holders of a well-known comic-strip series, calendars featuring a drawing resembling one of the album covers of this series. In particular, in place of characters who appear in the original drawing, the party included the mayor of the city of Ghent surrounded by North African and coloured immigrants picking up coins which he was throwing around himself.
In his opinion, (see EUROPE 11085), the Advocate General formed the view that, to be considered a “parody” within the meaning of the directive and to be able to be published without the consent of rights holders, a work must not only be an imitation of the original but also display its own original character and seek to be humorous or satirical. Moreover, he ruled out that any reworking of the original work presenting a message that radically differs from society's deepest convictions could be considered a parody. This is the key point underpinning the case. (FG)