Stephen Bulger (Toronto) gallery buys the V. Maier negatives

Just read the article. What it looks like is that Vivian Maier's brother Charles, if he is still alive, has 6 years to make the claim to her possessions. As Cook County determined him to be the only legitimate heir.
If he does not appear, then everything belongs to the current owners of the negatives - Maloof and Bulger. But until that 6 years is up, Cook County has deemed themselves the owners of the copyrights to VM's work. They want to monetize her images by licensing the images.
It seems the best thing to do would be to fight Cook County until that 6 year time frame has expired, then they - Maloof and Bulger - would have rightful control of the images. But that would take a lot of $$ in legal fees, while the tax payer is paying the bill for Cook County.

Maybe Maloof and Bulger should have a crowdfunding to pay for the fight? In return you get a print of your choice and an acknowledgment. I'd be in.
 
photomoof said:
No, if the brother does not show up, then Cook County owns the copyrights and can auction them off. However other heirs can come forward and claim ownership in court.

The negatives are not in play, Cook County has no claim on them, they were abandoned before her death. Maloof and Bulger will never gain copyright without an heir they can buy from.

The rub here is, without the negatives the copyright is valueless, and without the copyright the negs are devalued.

However much later the copyright will run out. (author’s life plus an additional 70 years.)
Click to expand...

Thanks for the break down. It's been a very peculiar situation, splitting the baby seems suitable in the circumstances.

I wonder if it 'd still be possible to show the photographs on a non-commercial basis, e.g. an exhibition? Perhaps a deal can also be reached between the respective negative and copyright owners, even for a share in profits from tickets, merchandise, exhibition catalogues. Remains to be seen and assuming both sides prefer to break the impasse than the alternative.

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