Cardi B is set to testify in court in a lawsuit against her filed by Kevin Michael Brophy Jr. over her 2016 mixtape cover art. Kevin is suing Cardi B for $5 million. He claims that the artwork ruined his private life because it looks exactly like the tattoo on his back. The lawsuit claims that a “digital artist found the tiger and serpent tattoo on the internet and superimposed the body art on the model of the cover, replacing the man’s original cartoon-style back tattoo.” He further called the cover art “completely raunchy [and] disgusting.” Cardi B alleges that she was unaware of the process. “That’s a Black man with hair, and this is a white man with a shaven head,”
Peter J. Anderson, the rapper’s attorney, asserts that Kevin and his wife “have been unable to identify anyone who recognized the tattoo to be Brophy Jr.’s and spoke to them about it and that the tattoo artist — who owns the copyright to the artwork — has never sued over the cover.” The photoshop work was also supposedly “altered and manipulated to such a degree” that it is now considered a “newly created piece of art” that is protected by the First Amendment.
Brophy Jr.’s lawyer suggests that the tattoo is “the personal property and identity” of his client. “Ladies and gentlemen, the lawsuit is simple. This wasn’t hers to take,” he shared. “This was his likeness. It’s the personal property, the personal identity of a private citizen, not another celebrity. This is a private person. Unless you ask for it or pay for it, you can’t take it under the land’s laws of the land… You can’t take somebody else’s image and do something offensive with it, hold it in a false light.” He adds that Cardi and her team “decided they would ruin a private family’s life for five years” when they ignored Brophy Jr.’s cease-and-desist letter from 2017.
– Excerpt from an article for Hypebest by Sophie Caraan. Read the full article here.
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