Author’s moral rights: Eric Clapton’s LAYLA album cover.

[11/01/2019]

The cover of the album, Layla and other assorted love songs, is illustrated by a painting called La fille au bouquet (girl with flower bunch) by the French-Danish painter Emile Frandsen:

This artwork was offered to the singer by the son of the painter in 1970. In 2011, one of the painter’s heirs launched a suit against Eric Clapton and its record company for infringement of moral rights: violation of the right of integrity and of the right of divulgation.

In 2017, the Court of Appeal found that the painting’s integrity was not prejudiced insofar as the artwork on the album cover was reproduced in its entirety with the painter’s signature and, also rejected the claim for violation of the right of divulgation.

In a ruling issued on 10 October 2018, the Supreme Court confirmed that the painting’s integrity was not prejudiced in the present case but that the sole fact of handing over to a third party the physical object which embodies an artwork is per se not sufficient to establish that the right of divulgation has been exercised.