Louth County Council await new design for WW1 memorial
Centre image removed after American artist threatened legal action for copyright infringement
Louth Chief Executive Joan Martin told members at the Louth County Council June meeting that she was “very very disappointed about this being raised and about the manner in which this is being raised, and about the controversy that's being raised”, in relation to the World War One memorial in Dundalk, that had to have its main image removed after an American artist threatened legal action for copyright infringement.
The memorial is to commemorate the 310 men from Co Louth who lost their lives in World War One and is funded by Louth County Council and SEUPB EU PEACE IV funding, with an estimated capital cost of the project is €40,000 VAT inclusive, according to the Terms of Reference in the Request for Tenders issues in March 2021.
The memorial was due to be unveiled at the end of May but now sits at its location at The Crescent in Dundalk, awaiting a new centre image to be etched on.
The matter was raised at the June meeting, initially by Cllr Tomás Sharkey, who asked for an updated timeline on the completion of the memorial. Ms Martin replied to Cllr Sharkey to say that they are waiting on an updated design from the contractor, which would be on the way very shortly.
The matter was raised later in the meeting by Cllr Maeve Yore, who asked if legal action was being taken in relation to the monument, and “who is responsible for the debacle”.
Cllr Maria Doyle also spoke on the matter, saying that she was on a committee when she was with Dundalk Town Council up to 2018, that was trying to organise the creation of the memorial. She said they were told in 2018 by Louth County Council that the committee didn't have the legal standing to go any further with the project and it was taken over by the Council.
Cllr Doyle said they had done a huge amount of work on the design and layout of a potential memorial and felt they should have had an input to the memorial. She questioned where the design of the memorial came from and was it someone in Louth County Council who selected the image and what sort of research was done to ascertain the origin of the image.
In her response Ms Martin said “that Louth County Council tendered for the project and that ”how would anybody know where a piece of art came from, or whether it was a copy from someone else, or whether it was an original artwork?”
She said that they had been contacted “out of the blue” by an artist, based in the United States she believed, to say that the memorial copied an element of a war memorial in Washington he was involved in the design of.She added that they are expecting a new design from the company who are constructing the memorial and that the memorial will be completed and unveiled as soon as possible.
Cllr Yore asked “in relation to copyright, surely there has to be due diligence in relation to anything that goes up, and we check that it's not [infringing copyright]?”
Ms Martin interjected to ask “check where? Check how? How would you check across the entire planet if there was a war memorial in any town or village all over the world that was similar? There was no way of checking something like that. Absolutely no way of checking.”
Cllr Edel Corrigan then spoke on the matter to say, “you ask from a declaration from the provider, simple as - is this your original work?” Ms Martin replied to say, that her understanding was that the company constructing the memorial believed it to be original work when they submitted it, but added that there is no way to check that it is an original piece.