Payments from auctioneers and dealers to artists for reproducing art works in their catalogues appear to be flowing a little more freely of late.
The annual report of Viscopy, Australasia's major and non-for-profit copyright management agency for the visual arts, shows a lift in its revenue from $2.43 million to $3.89 million in the year ended June 30 last.
Dealer and auction house payments for copyright provide a big part of one of the two major revenue streams of the company.
The other stream comes essentially from photo-copying.
Allowing the added revenue from the extra members Viscopy gathered during the year, reluctance to pay appears to be ebbing as users recognise the statutory as well as moral rights artists have to these payments.
Some artists readily forego collecting the revenue in return for the value the reproduction might add to their reputation.
Others, as footnotes in sales catalogues suggest when works for sale go unillustrated, equally clearly do not, although the motivation to refuse reproduction rights may not be financially based.
Some artists may not want to see certain aspects of their oeuvre overexposed.
Viscopy's revenue blew out from $2,431,398 to $3,895,584 during the year but this also included the photocopying paid by such institutions as public libraries and schools.
In her position as interim chief executive while the chief executive is on maternity leave, Alida Stanley was understandably reluctant to elaborate on any aspect of the annual report.
And she certainly would not comment on big users rumoured to be reluctant payers.
But in the report she disclosed a 9 per cent increase to almost 8000 members in Australasia over the latest period. The company claims to reporesent 43 per cent of Australian and NZ artists and their beneficiaries and 40,000 international artists and beneficiaries in Australian and NZ territories through reciprocal agreements with 45 visual arts rights management agencies overseas.
In what now looks like a minor skirmish, but which soaked up a lot of energy at the time, some auction houses have left blank spaces in their catalogues to make their reluctance to advise vendors to pay the fee even more readily apparent.
Strong objections were raised on the grounds that collection involved disproportional effort related to the cost and time incurred and disadvantaged young and emerging artists in particular.
The fury that is being raised by former Arts Minister Peter Garrett's resale royalty scheme among secondary market dealers and auction houses is beginning to make the row over copyright fees between dealers and auctioneers on the one hand and Viscopy and other copright managers on the other look like a storm in a teacup.
The choice of Suddenly Everything Happened, an oil painted by Charles Blackman in 1956, for full page reproduction in the latest annual report by the designer, appears very apt.
"It" - the resale rights launch - happened elsewhere as the Copyright Agency Ltd picked up the government mandated account. It is a story that might well have taken place in Wonderland.
The painting is from Blackman's Alice series and shows a table top with a teacup, a vase falling over and a falling paint pot spewing its contents. The rabbit's ears prick up.
The reproduction is naturally "licensed by Viscopy" and stated to be so - a footnote that appears increasingly in Australian art auction catalogues.
Viscopy's distribution to members at $2,884,215 left it at a comfort band of around $1 million under income as had the previous year's distribution when $1,547,752 was paid out.
Employee benefits increased from $387,502 to $630,061 but other expenses were pared from $489,107 to $366,127. The company should be a leaner stronger machine with which to pursue reluctant or forgetful copyright users in future.
Evidently Viscopy so far has not used its muscle to pursue payments through the courts, although a local dealer's use of an Andy Warhol image in an advertisement for an artist's show aroused some publicity about five years ago and was settled well before it reached that state.
Stanley would not give any breakdown between the reproduction stream and the copyright stream of the business. Equally disappointing, she would not elaborate on the size of the payment to Australasian artists versus overseas artists as Viscopy also collects fees here for overseas artists.
In its early days it is thought to have been more of service to overseas artists than locals.
The artists (or their estates or nominees) who receive the fees can vary greatly from year to year according to their appearance in exhibitions to sales. The most popular Australasian artist in the latest year was Robert Klippel reflecting, presumably, the family/studio dispersals including those of the Sotheby's sale in November.
Viscopy's most popular international artist for use was Pablo Picasso, conceivably reflecting the demands of an exhibition devoted to his work at the National Gallery of Victoria three years ago.
In 2009 Picasso was second.
Lin Onus was in second place on the Australian list and Franz Kupka on the international followed by Emily Kngwarreye and Andy Warhol respectively at third.
Lyn Wendon's appearance at fourth on the list reflects the photocopying of her work and use of her books in schools and libraries. In the previous year she was the third most popular artist for inquiries through Viscopy in a list headed by Roy Lichtenstein.
