Artist selling drawings of my house

[TechGinny]

I've just discovered that an artist local to the area is selling drawings of my property on her website. It's not easily viewed by the road, which means she would have had to enter the land to draw it.

I'm feeling quite annoyed about this, as she has never made contact to ask permission.

AIBU unreasonable to feel like this, and would you make contact to ask her to remove it from her website?

One lady artist trespassing for long enough to get a picture of an house she admires is not really unsettling. This is the worst case scenario. It's all very snowflakey.

Personally I would have CCTV so I didn't need to write letters or wonder.

@EspressoDoubleShot sorry you're making me laugh trying to imply this woman who has simply sketched a building is a master criminal.

You're using language you've heard on The Bill reruns

The local pizza place does not have "explicit consent" when they flyer drop. It's not illegal though, nor is it illegal for them to take a photo while they are there are pass it to their artist friend to draw.

Calm down. Someone drew a picture.

If op was posting about a regular house on an estate,someone accessing property and drawing it she would be supported
All the judge rinders would rise up quoting full itv in support

If she has trespassed on private property to draw the picture you could take her to court for trespass.

I know with the National Trust for example, they retain the copyright for photographs taken of their properties from their land. They’ll peruse people who sell pictures online taken without permission.

Ah sorry. Not The Bill. Judge Rinder more your bag? 😂😂

Yanbu and I wouldn’t like it either. Our house isn’t on Google Maps or visible and if someone took a photograph to paint it, they would have needed to come off the pathway and gone out of their way to do so. It’s not the kind of place you can accidentally find yourself either.

I would ask her how she gained access to the image in the first place. If she is selling the pictures with your house name and area written on them, I would also ask her to remove it.

Can you determine roughly when the original image was obtained or drawing completed from any changes in the garden etc?

Unlike you Alvin I don’t watch the bill or reference it to real life

Or has she drawn the pictures from a photo taken by drone. Plenty of people do that.

I wouldn't mind as long as the pictures didn't have the address written on them.

@annacondom

Bloody hell, I would be fuming! At the very least she should be giving you a free copy. But you need to decide what you want to result from this before you contact her. Just an apology or acknowledgement?

I had a situation a few years ago. I took a unique photo of a local church and donated it to them to use for fundraising/publications. Someone unconnected took it and used it in their book without any attribution. I asked for advice on MN and someone said in her job she would pay up to £300 for permission to use such a photo in a for-profit educational book. Long story short, I got a free copy of the book and a promise of attribution of the photo to me if the book is reprinted. NB a church is regarded as public, in that anyone can take photos. The issue is that this was my photo.

Right, but that is different because the OP didn't take and donate a photograph of her house. Photographs are different because they have copyright. The outside of a house doesn't have copyright.

I agree with a previous poster, it's cheeky and intrusive.

Out of interest what would you have said if she'd asked permission first? I'm guessing you'd have said no.

And those saying £40 is cheap for a hand drawn picture, it's just prints she's selling surely? £40 isn't necessarily cheap for a print - all depends on the size, printing method, etc.

I think it is not unreasonable for @TechGinny to be ‘weirded out’ or upset by the thought that a stranger may well have come onto her private property, to obtain the image of her house, to paint it and sell it. Clearly there are plenty of people on this thread who wouldnt be upset by that - and that is fair enough too, but doesn’t invalidate the OP’s feelings.

I think a polite message to the artist, asking how she managed to get the view of the house she used for her painting, would be a reasonable next step.

Often on mn the first few posts set the tone for all subsequent response

maybe someone used a drone.

You are quite naive if you think no one can see anything without coming on your land.

@EspressoDoubleShot

If op was posting about a regular house on an estate,someone accessing property and drawing it she would be supported All the judge rinders would rise up quoting full itv in support

Nonsense. I have an ex council home. Couldn't give a monkeys if someone drew it and sold the pics. As long as I wasn't in the painting sat on my ass in front of the tv in my skants.

It doesn't make a jot of difference. Other than I'd assume the artist was a bit weird. But heyho, theres no accounting for artistic temperament.

@TechGinny I sympathise with you. I had a similar experience when a local ‘historian’ (busybody) decided to set up a page about the history of my house (historically interesting but not listed) it is in a very rural situation, hidden from the road and is only accessible along a private lane which clearly states no right of way/access etc. There are no public pathways/bridleways. This ‘historian’ decided to write (badly) about what I had ‘done’ to the house in terms of renovations, the inference being that I had stripped it of period features etc. The truth was they had all been ripped out on the 70’s/80’s by the previous owner and I had painstakingly restored them all. The blog went on to say how they had used a ladder to peer over the fence of a neighbouring property to decide all of this. Never once visited, never once asked me as the owner as to what we had done to the house. They then linked the house to the original estate agents listing which I had already removed upon purchase as it had details of the floor plans which are frankly a wannabe thief’s blueprint and it compromised my family’s security. The blog gave no no end of issues with people assuming they could just ignore the signs, traipse over private land and have a look - especially during lockdown. One tourist even jumped into a paddock where my neighbour’s horse had just given birth to ‘get a selfie with the baby horse’ I tried engaging with the blogger
via their web page but received no response. In the end a local councillor was kind enough to track them down to speak to them about removing the inaccuracies. They decided however to ignore my offer to leave it up but to correct the inaccuracies and took the page down. I received a very odd email from ‘outraged at x’ about how unreasonable I was and how embarrassing it was to have involved a local councillor. I thought about replying but frankly the person sounded unhinged so I left it. I did notice a sarky post on a local FB page (also referred to my unreasonable neighbour objecting to selfies with her horses).

There are nowt so queer as folk. I’d send the email as suggested up thread and see if you can get a dialogue going. Good luck to you though!

So let’s be clear not a from pavement drawing that’s not trespassing
Someone rocks up in your garden without consent, that’s no problem?

What does ‘notable’ family mean?

I'm guessing landed gentry who owned a large enough house (and estate) to warrant employing quite a few local staff for house keeping, gardens, farming/stables and the like.

Flying a drone low over private property can be considered trespass.for example you can't go and fly one low over someone's home and look in windows etc.

If someone walked up to your door to deliver a leaflet and thought "what a pretty house" and took a photo and later did a drawing of it, would that be unacceptable? I don't think so, unless they are disclosing the address when selling the pictures, in which case it becomes a bit dodgy.

We live in a picturesque square, which is public, so no access issue, but I like coming across old photos and drawings of it.

I think it is fair to get in touch with the artist and say you would rather she did not sell drawings of your house. If she agrees not to do any more, you could buy one of the ones she has done as a gesture of good will. If she says she wants to keep selling them, all you can do is ask her not to disclose the address.

I have some suggestions you can do:

Take a screenshot of the artists work (of your house). On the iPhone google app you can click on this "camera" icon and upload the screenshot you took and it will search all of Google for any results matching that painting. That will then show you if this artist is the only person to have that artwork. That will also show you any "similar" results, I.e any images of your house on google.

If it just returns with that one artist then they are definitely your source for the artwork.

You can then friendly approach them curious about their art work. You'll probably get more responses to your questioning in this manner if they think you are a curious buyer. Maybe ask if it's an original and whether it was drawn from real life or if it's the artist's house. They might open up about how they did the artwork.

So it's all fine and dandy for someone to tresspass on your land, take photos of your house, make drawings from those photos and flog them online? And being a bit miffed about that and not wanting trespassers taking pictures of your house is unhinged? Good to know. 🙄

I would be very annoyed if this happened to me and my property, I would seek legal advice on both the trespass and the selling of the pictures.

I live on a "famous" street in a city. Very distinctive and often photographed and painted. I cannot go into a greetings card shop in my city without seeing a picture of my house. Someone recently gave me a coaster with my house on it that they bought from a shop. I feel really lucky to live here. I think it's really odd that you're bothered by this. Maybe you could take a photo and do a painting and cash in on your own house!

I think you’re being unreasonable. While I can understand it’s your home, if it belongs to a historically notable local family and is a local landmark you can’t be surprised if people are interested in it. Your situation sounds akin to the Queen being upset people want to take photos of Windsor Castle.

You could always sell up and move elsewhere if you’re not comfortable with the local interest. I just don’t think you can have your cake and eat it.

In some countries, it's possible to enforce copyright over a building's look. See the Eiffel Tower at night. You can't sell photographs of that legally. I think in the US there are similar rights over numerous skyscrapers.