Legal Definitions - droit moral

Droit Moral

Droit moral, a French term meaning "moral right," refers to a legal doctrine that grants creators certain personal rights over their works, distinct from their economic rights (like the right to sell or license a work). These rights are considered inherent to the creator and their personal connection to their artistic or literary creation. They generally allow creators to protect the integrity of their work and ensure they are properly recognized for it, even after the work has been sold or licensed.

Key aspects of droit moral typically include:

• The right to be identified as the author or creator of the work (the right of attribution).
• The right to prevent others from altering, distorting, or mutilating the work in a way that could harm the creator's reputation or the work's artistic integrity (the right of integrity).
• In some jurisdictions, it may also include the right to decide when and if a work is published, or even to withdraw a work from publication.

Here are some examples illustrating how droit moral applies:

• Example 1: Public Art Installation

  A renowned sculptor creates a large, intricate public art installation for a city park. Years later, the city council decides to add new, brightly colored elements to the sculpture and remove some original components to make space for a new pathway, all without consulting the sculptor. Under droit moral, the sculptor could object to these changes, arguing that they distort the original artistic vision and integrity of their work, even though the city owns the physical sculpture. The sculptor's personal connection and artistic reputation are tied to the work's original form.

• Example 2: Literary Adaptation

  An acclaimed novelist writes a complex historical novel. A film studio acquires the rights to adapt it into a movie. However, during production, the studio makes significant alterations to the plot, changes the ending to be more commercially appealing, and rewrites key character dialogues, fundamentally altering the novel's original message and tone. The studio then promotes the film as "the definitive adaptation of the novelist's work." The novelist, invoking droit moral, could challenge these substantial changes, asserting their right to protect the integrity of their literary creation and to prevent their name from being associated with a version that misrepresents their original artistic intent.

• Example 3: Digital Photography and Advertising

  A freelance photographer captures a striking black-and-white portrait. A company licenses the photograph for a specific marketing campaign. Later, the company decides to reuse the image for a different campaign, but this time they digitally alter it by adding vibrant, artificial colors, superimposing a distracting product logo directly over the subject's face, and cropping it awkwardly. They also fail to credit the photographer in the new advertisement. The photographer could invoke droit moral to object to the distortion and mutilation of their original photographic work, which compromises its artistic integrity. Additionally, they could assert their right to be properly attributed as the creator of the image, especially when it's used in a modified form they do not endorse.