Abstract

The 1990 Visual Artists Rights Act (VARA) is a provision of U.S. copyright law that seeks to protect the noneconomic rights of artists, called "moral rights." These rights are due to the "presumed intimate bond between artists and their works."1 In the United States it protects rights of artistic attribution and integrity: the artwork cannot be claimed as the work of another, and it cannot be distorted. In some cases VARA protects artworks from destruction. But what is the nature of this intimate bond? The underlying principle behind the legal construct of artistic moral rights is that the artwork is an extension of its creator such that any harm to the work is a violation of the personhood of the artist.2 Another ..