Fun, annoying or simply silly, memes have invaded social media in the last few years. The Merriam-Webster defines "meme" as "an idea, behavior, style, or usage that spreads from person to person within a culture" and as "an amusing or interesting item or genre of items that is spread widely online especially through social media".
The definition "interesting items" refers to an entirely new picture or video created by somebody or to media based on a movie still or an image of a celebrity or a popular character, at times personalised via a slogan, a motto, a filter or another visual alteration.
For their nature, memes have sparked a debate about copyright: the creator of a specific image has usually got the rights on the reproduction, modification and distribution of such image and memes naturally infringe such copyrights.
That said, when an original image is modified, reproduced and posted, maybe altering a particular feature or adding a catchy slogan that ends up making that image popular and go viral, the copyright of that particular alteration remains with the person that has created that change.
So, creating new work without permission and within certain parameters (think about parody or criticism), may fall under fair use of a copyrighted image, even though things may change from case to case.
But what happens if a fashion designer takes a meme and copies it? Let's look at a couple of cases.
Between 2018 and 2019 we have seen a proliferation of big jacket and big bag memes, with Instagram accounts such as @itsmaysmemes and @thebigbagclub altering puffer jackets, sneakers and bags donned by models to gargantuan proportions, taking them to an entirely new and comical level.
Jeremy Scott played along the same lines in Moschino's Pre-Fall 2020 and Fall 2020 menswear show, that took place at the Transit Museum in New York last week. The collection tried to recreate a trip through the New York subway, but was also a journey through the city's subcultures.
Scott altered the proportions of faux fur stoles, thick gold chains, bags and puffer jackets and included in the collection items like super sized jackets and rucksacks that may prompt wearers to find new and unusual ways to access doors, lifts and means of transport.
The baseball hats with the house logos also went through a magnifying process achieving in some cases the same effect obtained by Lonnie Walker IV and his "floating hat" look at last year's NBA draft (in his case it was his sky-high hairstyle that allowed him to come up with the unusual look View this photo).
We have seen other oversized yet conceptual collection this year based on the distortion of proportions and sizes, but this one seemed instead to play entirely on the big jacket/big bag meme (while nodding to Kanye West and Lil Pump's 2018 video for "I Love It"...).
This process of "taking inspiration" from popular culture is nothing unusual for Jeremy Scott, who likes to define himself as "the people's designer", even though he has often proved he is more of a remixer of other people's designs.
Yet Scott wasn't the only one who jumped on the meme bandwagon: Opening Ceremony recently created the "Super Large Tote", a giant yellow PVC tote bag that could be considered as the ultimate reaction to the curse of the mini bag.
This trend for oversized items poses a few issues: first and foremost these items are made using more materials than needed, putting more stress on our planet and on the wardrobes of consumers (how many of us have enough space in their houses to store such pieces?), but it also prompts us to ponder a bit about copyright issues.
If certain memes and images produced by specific Instagram accounts have spawned a trend for oversized jackets and bags, who infringed the copyright, the owners of the Instagram accounts who altered the original images to create new and fun artworks, or the designers who then created surreal items that, based on those images, will generate a profit for their fashion houses and brands?
Unfortunately, copyright law doesn't help us in meme matters: the authors of the memes we have seen in this post created static images of celebrities or models wearing huge jackets and bags, so, in a way, they created an idea that may not be protected under copyright.
Yet this story makes you think: while the creators of image-based memes are reminded to always check the source of the image they want to use or the person featured in it, and maybe opt for an image or clip that is already labeled for reuse or is in the public domain to avoid legal issues, it looks like fashion designers may not really abide to these rules, but are free to take ideas from those same memes that may put their creators at risk of a legal action. Will laws regarding memes and copyrights change in the next decade and take into consideration the power of meme-spawned trends in the fashion industry?
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