Ai Weiwei awarded 230k euro in damages for advertising infringement
(Artdaily.org)

A Danish court Wednesday ordered a Volkswagen dealer to pay Chinese artist Ai Weiwei more than 230,000 euros ($258,000) in damages for using one of the artist`s works in an ad without authorisation. `SMC`s (the dealer) use of the piece of art constituted a violation of the marketing law`s paragraph... on good marketing practises,` the tribunal ruled. In 2017, SMC used a photo of a Volkswagen Polo parked in front of an Ai Weiwei art installation in Copenhagen to promote the launch of a new car on its website and in the dealer`s customer magazine. The work by the 61-year-old dissident artist, entitled `Soleil Levant`, comprised 3,500 life jackets collected from refugees who had arrived on the Greek island of Lesbos between 2015 and 2016, crammed into the windows of the Charlottenborg art gallery. The court held that commercial use of the work was a `clear contradiction of the considerations and thoughts