RIHA Resolution on Copyright

As agreed at the RIHA General Assembly, Rome, 8 November 2008

1. Statement

"Copyright seeks to protect the rights of authorship while securing the
dissemination of knowledge. It protects the form of expression of ideas,
but not the ideas, information or concepts expressed (.) A regime which is
unduly protective of the interest of existing rights holders may therefore
inhibit, or even stifle, the development of original material."

British Academy, Copyright and Research in the Humanities and Social
Sciences, 2006

RIHA, the International Association of Research Institutes in the History
of Art, is concerned that recent developments in technology, legislation
and practice have meant that the various copyright exemptions that exist to
promote the advance of creative and scholarly work are not being applied to
achieve their intended effect. RIHA strongly believes that neither
copyright nor licensing rules should inhibit the development and diffusion
of original scholarly research, regardless of the way in which it is
published or otherwise disseminated.

RIHA calls upon copyright holders and other stakeholders including
publishers, galleries, museums, and collecting societies, when dealing with
scholarly research, to:

- Subscribe to the definition of scholarly research as stated in section 2
of this document
- Apply the existing copyright exemptions in keeping with their intended
purpose
- Refrain from demanding or refusing unnecessary permissions, or granting
these permissions on unreasonable terms.

RIHA further calls upon collecting societies and monopoly copyright
holders, when charging for the use and reproduction of images in scholarly
publications, to charge solely the marginal cost to the institution of
making the specific reproduction for delivery to the researcher, rather
than the costs of creating and maintaining a collection of images or of
making provision for a profit margin on transactions.

2. Definitions of research

For the purpose of clarity, RIHA proposes the following definitions of
research:*

Scholarly research
A type of non-commercial research whose principal objective is public
benefit rather than private profit and/or the recovery of the costs of the
research. Scholarly research may include the initial stages of collecting
material as well as subsequent stages which involve the analysis and
publication of the results. The presentation of the results will be without
charge to the recipients or will be at a charge which can only be expected
to cover the reasonable costs of production and distribution, including the
reasonable profits of a commercial publisher.

Commercial research
Research whose principal objective is profit rather than public benefit.
Commercial research normally includes a charge to the user that covers the
cost of the research as well as its dissemination, and includes a profit
margin.

3. Recommendations

RIHA urges copyright holders and other stakeholders to respect of the
following British Academy recommendations (paraphrased):

Recommendation 1
Copyright must provide reasonably broad and practically
effective exemptions for research and private study, and for criticism or
review.

Recommendation 2
With regard to the exception for research and private study under the 1988
Copyright Act:

a) 'Research' should be treated as distinct from 'private study' and should
not only encompass the intial stages of an academic project but also
subsequent analysis and publication
b) Research should be treated as non-commercial where the taking of
copyright material is fair, and where any charge to the user would only
cover production and distribution of a publication (including reasonable
profit of a commercial publisher)
c) Research funded by a research council or charity is by definition
non-commercial
d) In the case of commercial research, charges should be reasonable and
abuse should be restrained.

Membership of RIHA
Bibliotheca Hertziana, Max-Planck-Institut für Kunstgeschichte, Roma
Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts (CASVA), Washington DC
Ústav dejin umení, Akademie ved Ceské Rebubliky (Institute of Art History,
Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic), Praha
Clark Art Institute, Williamstown
Courtauld Institute of Art, London
Deutsches Forum für Kunstgeschichte / Centre Allemand d'Histoire de l'Art,
Paris
Istituto di Storia dell'Arte, Fondazione Giorgio Cini, Venezia
Getty Research Institute, Los Angeles
Institut za povijest umjetnosti (Institute of Art History), Zagreb
Fundació Institut Amatller d'Art Hispànic, Barcelona
Institut National d`Histoire de l'Art (INHA), Paris
Istituto Nazionale di Archeologia e Storia dell'Arte, Roma
Koninklijk Instituut voor het Kunstpatrimonium/Institut royal du Patrimoine
artistique (IRPA-KIK), Brussel/Bruxelles
Instytut Sztuki, Polskiej Akademii Nauk (Institute of Arts of the Polish
Academy of Sciences), Warszawa
Miedzynarodowe Centrum Kultury (International Culture Centre), Kraków
Kommission für Kunstgeschichte, Österreichische Akademie der
Wissenschaften, Wien
Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz, Firenze
Magyar Tudományos Akadémia (Institute for Art History), Budapest
Rijksbureau voor Kunsthistorische Dokumentatie (RKD), (Netherlands
Institute for Art History) Den Haag
Schweizerisches Institut für Kunstwissenschaft (SIK), Zürich
Umetnostnozgodovinski institut Franceta Steleta, Slovenska akademija
znanosti in umetnosti (France Stele Institute of Art History, Slovenian
Academy of Sciences and Arts), Ljubljana
Ústav dejín umenia, Slovenskej akadémie vied (Insititute of Art History,
Slovak Academy of Sciences), Bratislava
Visual Arts Research Institute, Edinburgh (VARIE), Edinburgh
Warburg Institute, London
Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte, München

Note
[*] The definitions of research are based on the findings and
recommendations of the British Academy report Copyright and Research in the
Humanities and Social Sciences (2006) and the Guidelines on Copyright and
Academic Research, issued as a supplement to the report. RIHA also notes
that the Joint Guidelines on Copyright and Academic Research (2008),
published jointly by the British Academy and the Publishers Association,
offers valuable clarification of some of the issues touched on in the 2006
report. All three documents can be accessed and downloaded at
http://www.britac.ac.uk/reports/copyright