Award-Winning Artist Sues High-Profile Newport Gallery Owner Over Copyright Infringement

Award-Winning Artist Sues High-Profile Newport Gallery Owner Over Copyright Infringement

Award-winning artist Mia Tarducci has filed a lawsuit in U.S. District federal court in Rhode Island against Newport gallery operator Kristen Coates. 

The legal battle pits two players in the art world over what constitutes creative rights -- and copyright infringement. 

Tarducci, who currently lives and works out of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania was named Emerging Artist of the Year by the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts.

GET THE LATEST BREAKING NEWS HERE -- SIGN UP FOR GOLOCAL FREE DAILY EBLAST

A Newport native, Tarducci has shown her work in significant shows and at some top galleries across the country. Her work can be found on the Saatchi website for as much as $12,500.

Newport gallery owner Coates refused to comment. According to Coates' attorney Michael Farley, "Kristen is not comfortable commenting."

“Kristen Coates is known primarily for her curating expertise both in private collections and commercially, offers her curatorial and art styling services along with a wide range of art and objects sure to make any home or business expressive and polished,” cites her website. 

 

How It Began

In 2019, the two women teamed up to present a series of works by Tarducci at Coates’ gallery and shortly thereafter, the relationship soured.

In the lawsuit, Tarducci says that Coates, after displaying her work, then ripped her off by essentially copying Tarducci’s paintings. Tarducci has sued for copyright infringements. 

The title of Coates' work? "The Cost of Doing Business."

The lawsuit asserts, "Tarducci investigated and found that Coates was offering the Infringing works for sale on her website for $3,000 each."

"I brought works from Pittsburgh per [Coates] request to Newport. And she had my pieces in her possession for about a week,” Tarducci told GoLocal in a phone interview.

"She had originally told me there was a potential buyer. After a week she asked me to pick up the work. I was showing at a pop-up [in Newport] — I didn’t think there was a conflict — so I picked up my work," said Tarducci. 

"I grew up in Newport. The pop-up was at the former Water Bros on Memorial. The woman who ran it, Sandee Saunders, had done a popup for couture fashion and art with the [Newport] Art Museum. This was an extension of that project — it was for a few months," said Tarducci.

"If [Coates] had kept my work, it would be exclusive, but she didn’t. There was no contract — there was no issue. That relationship is while it’s being shown [there] there it’s exclusive to that gallery," said Tarducci.

"The reality is, this is a very important topic that affects the artist community," said Tarducci, of her copyright infringement legal battle. "I had another incident that ended up being settled here [in Pittsburgh]. It actually happens a lot, and too frequently. The system in order to fight it is onerous — through the federal court system. The fight itself is financially larger than the work.  I am a strong advocate for the arts in Pittsburgh."

"This is something that needs to be addressed."

 

 

Origins of Works -- and Dispute

Tarducci spoke to the body of work that was shown in Newport, and the inspiration behind it. 

"I was in the process of moving from one studio to another. I had a lot of life changes — for artists, studios are your church and your peace of mind. While I was excited to move studios, it was emotional," she said.

"I was looking for ways to document it. Every mark on that [studio] floor was mine. So I thought I’d take photographs...but I'm not a photographer. So it became reference for this [painting] idea, initially for an enormous piece, but it didn’t feel right. What then felt right was to make them tiles, as the studio had the tiles. It was conceptual — the idea behind it was you leave a space, you leave a mark, and there’s beauty in the simplicity, wiith just a few markings, some deliberate, some free-flowing," said Tarducci.

"When you’re doing work like this, there’s a lot of waste, if you don’t get the right balance. I’m working with linen there’s no room for error. So It took about 5 months, and even then I was terrified this was not going to be well accepted. People can have real opinions on minimalist work — I was really proud of the work, whether it was well-received or not," said Tarducci, of the series that garnered critical acclaim.

Tarducci said her reaction to seeing Coates then show the works she said were "substantially" similar to hers.

"I reached out to her with a personal letter and said this is substantially similar [to my work]," said Tarducci. "It wasn't until after my letter — she didn’t take it down until I got lawyers involved."

"I think it’s a larger problem. It’s not about Kristen — it’s that people believe that this kind of behavior won’t be questioned and artists don’t have the resources to do anything about it. It happens all the time. In the age of Instagram people can pick up all the time on your work. But this is just brazen," said Tarducci. 

"The ones I sell for are the double the ones she put up there, but [this is about] the time involved now and attorneys' fees. I’d had it happen before  — I know that you register the works which have, and I have a pending 10th [painting]," said Tarducci. 

"People might look at [her paintings] and say it’s not exact, it’s not a forgery. But what I always say is, what does the body of work look like? This [series I did] is a departure from what I usually do. This is minimalist abstract, when I usually do additive abstract — it was an important series in my career and as an artist. The original 8 were a work altogether at Carnegie which won an award — it was a great point in my career," said Tarducci. 

The lawsuit states, "By letter dated November 14, 2019, Coates, through counsel, responded that she would remove the Infringing Works from her gallery and website and she "pledge[d]" to keep them in her private collection in the future. Coates did not remove the works from her website. For months they continued to appear on the designers" page of the website."

The next step in this battle could be in a federal courtroom in Providence.

Editor's Note: A previous version had 2018; it was 2019 and has been corrected.