When award-winning photographer Lynn Goldsmith snapped a portrait of the artist formerly known as Prince for Newsweek in 1981, she could not have predicted the cultural and legal impact the pop legend’s portrait would have. In 1984, Vanity Fair sought to license the photograph for an “artist reference” in a story about the musician. Goldsmith agreed to license a one-time use of the photograph with full attribution. Vanity Fair commissioned Andy Warhol to create a silkscreen using Goldsmith’s image and used Warhol’s piece in the magazine with attribution as promised. However, Andy Warhol would go on to create 15 additional works using the Goldsmith photograph, now known as the artist’s “Prince Series.” Although Warhol created the Prince Series nearly forty years ago and three years prior to Warhol’s death, it was not until 2016 when Condé Nast featured the “Orange Prince,” one of Warhol’s silkscreen prints, as part of its tribute to Prince’s passing that Goldsmith learned of the additional reproductions. Condé Nast paid the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc. (“AWF”) $10,000 for the license, while Goldsmith received neither a license fee nor a source credit.

Upon failure to resolve the matter privately, AWF filed suit against Goldsmith, seeking a declaratory judgment that Warhol’s works did not infringe Goldsmith’s copyright in the original photograph, or, in the alternative, Warhol’s works constituted fair use of the subject photograph.[1] The Southern District of New York granted summary judgment to AWF on its claim of fair use, but the Second Circuit Court of Appeals reversed.

The Copyright Act motivates creativity by granting the author of an original creative work rights to reproduce their work, prepare derivatives works, and (in the case of pictorial or graphic works) display the copyrighted works publicly. This ownership interest in the creative work is balanced with the general public’s need to access the creative arts and exercise First Amendment rights. The fair use doctrine (the basis of AWF’s copyright infringement defense) allows use of a copyrighted work by persons other than the author for “purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching . . ., scholarship, or research”[2] and is evaluated through multiple factors. On petition for writ of certiorari, AWF asked the Supreme Court to evaluate whether the Condé Nast licenses are fair use based on just the first fair use factor, “the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes.”[3] On this issue, the Supreme Court agreed with the Second Circuit that the first factor of fair use favored Goldsmith. Because AWF did not dispute that the remaining fair use factors favored Goldsmith, the Court affirmed the Second Circuit’s finding of copyright infringement.

The first factor of fair use considers the nature of and reasons for a copier’s use of an original work.[4] “The larger the difference, the more likely the . . . factor weighs in favor of fair use. The smaller the difference, the less likely.”[5] When the original and the copy share a similar purpose, there is a concern that the copy will substitute for the original. Because the copyright owner has the exclusive right to prepare derivative works of their original—that is, recasts, transformations, or adaptations of the original work—the copy must be substantially transformative to have a different purpose or character than the original and that degree of transformation must also be balanced against any commercial nature of the use.

AWF argued that the Prince Series is sufficiently transformative of Goldsmith’s original photograph because the artworks convey a different meaning or message than her photograph. Yet, because the first use factor focuses on the degree in which the infringing use has a different purpose or character, the Court ultimately sided with Goldsmith. The majority found that AWF’s licensing of the “Orange Prince” copy to Condé Nast is not a substantially different purpose than Goldsmith’s photograph. Goldsmith took the original photograph and licensed it to Newsweek for use in an article about Prince, and then similarly licensed the work to Vanity Fair in association with an article about Prince. AWF licensed the “Orange Prince” to Condé Nast for an article about Prince. “As portraits of Prince used to depict Prince in magazine stories about Prince, the original photograph and AWF’s copying use of it share substantially the same purpose,” wrote Justice Sonia Sotomayor for the majority.

The majority opinion stresses that its opinion is limited to AWF’s license to Condé Nast: “Only . . . AWF’s commercial licensing of ‘Orange Prince’ to Condé Nast, is alleged to be infringing. We limit our analysis accordingly. In particular, the Court expresses no opinion as to the creation, display, or sale of any of the original Prince Series works.”[6] A concurrence written by Justice Neil Gorsuch (joined by Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson) further argued that the subsequent use (AWF’s licensing to Condé Nast) is the relevant inquiry rather than considering the original copier’s (Andy Warhol) intent in creating the “Orange Prince.” Conversely, Justice Elena Kagan’s (joined by Justice John Robert’s) condemnatory dissent sharply criticized the majority’s purported failure to appreciate how Warhol’s work differed from Goldsmith’s photograph. The dissent specifically cited to the Court’s decision just over two years ago in Google LLC v. Oracle America, Inc., where Warhol’s works were deemed the “perfect exemplar of a ‘copying use that adds something new and different.’”[7] The majority opinion dismisses the dissent as “a false equivalence between AWF’s commercial licensing and Warhol’s original creation” which results in “a series of misstatements and exaggerations, from the dissent’s very first sentence.”[8]

Most often in fair use inquiries, the dispute focuses on a copier’s use of the copyrighted work. It is not often a court is presented with the issue of a third party’s independent use (that is, use without the involvement of the copy’s creator) of the subsequent work. The majority opinion is narrow and focuses on one specific fair use factor in the context of one specific use. The Court’s decision cautions that the motivations behind the third party’s use must be considered on their own merit, rather than allowing the use and motivations of the original work to automatically transfer to the third party’s use.

Significant also to the finding of infringement is that the remaining fair use factors—including the fourth factor, “the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work”—was admitted to favor Goldsmith. In fact, that is precisely what occurred in this matter. Throughout her career, Goldsmith regularly photographed celebrities and licensed those photographs to magazines for articles about that celebrity. Condé Nast needed a picture of Prince for its 2016 memorial article about Prince, and it licensed the “Orange Prince” from AWF instead of Goldsmith’s photograph. This use “served the same essential purpose of depicting Prince in a magazine commemorating his life and career.”[9]

Despite the pains made by the majority to limit the opinion’s reach, this decision will likely have significant ramifications for the art world, particularly art markets and licensing. While here the original artist’s use itself is unaddressed, the decision may temper a creator’s ability to market new creative works that incorporate copyrighted works. The fair use doctrine’s intent is to protect use of copyrighted works in particular contexts and has particular importance in artistic criticism and parody. Though a creator may still be able to express themselves artistically using the copyrighted work, finding a gallery or dealer willing to accept the work may prove more challenging. For those willing to accept the work, expect strong warranties and artist indemnification contract clauses.

Read the Supreme Court’s opinion here.

Special thanks to William Wildman, Loyola University New Orleans College of Law, Class of 2023, for his assistance in the researching and drafting of this post.


[1] See Andy Warhol Found. for the Visual Arts, Inc. v. Goldsmith, 382 F.Supp. 3d 312 (S.D. N.Y. 2019).

[2] 17 U.S.C. § 107.

[3] Id.

[4] Andy Warhol Found. for the Visual Arts, Inc. v. Goldsmith, 598 U.S. ___ (2023).

[5] Id.

[6] Id. at ____ (slip op. 21).

[7] Id. at ____ (dissent op. 2).

[8] Id. at ____ (slip op. 22, n. 10).

[9] Id. at ___ (slip op. 23, n. 11).