From the Houston Chronicle:

I know of ballet companies who have changed choreographies after the choreographers have departed, and I know of at least two companies (one theatre and one ballet) who have altered my lighting designs without consulting with me.

They certainly had the legal right to do so, but did they have the ethical right?

Is that really the way you guys spell "mustache"?

"You could say Leonardo da Vinci is dead and legally the Louvre owns the Mona Lisa, but it doesn't have the moral right to paint a mustache on her..."

I think this sums up the whole argument.

I am still shocked to think that, after his death, Lady Churchill burnt her husband's portrait by Graham Sutherland. She said at the time: "It's my property I can do what I like with it." Legally, yes, but not from an artistic perspective and I still shudder when I think of this act of vandalism.

<img src="http://www.painterskeys.com/clickbacks/graham_sutherland.jpg" alt="" />

So, yes, I share the sculptor's anger that his work has been changed without his permission.

Jeff, these companies who have changed your lighting design without consultation, are they still crediting you? There is an example in film-making, where directors do not usually have control of the final version of the film; film-makers such as Peter Greenaway and John Boorman are exceptions and ensure that the contracts give them final say on the version circulated. From time to time, directors are so unhappy with the final cut that they ask for their name to be removed and between 1968 and 1997, the name Alan Smithee was substituted as a code to those in the know. Click here for more information.

I'm surprised that you say that companies have changed choreography after the choreogrpher has left and got away with it. I know of instances where companies have been threatened with having the rights withdrawn if they didn't conform. I'm aware that choreographers go back in to tidy up a work, which had "drifted". When the Royal Ballet perform Forsythe, it is taught again or checked by the Forsythe team.

I heard an instance, recently, of a dance company that re-costumed a work without permission of the living choreogrpher, but this was VERY naughty and they could have been sued.

<small>[ 12 March 2005, 10:29 AM: Message edited by: Stuart Sweeney ]</small>

Yes, "mustache" and "moustache" are acceptable spellings in the US.

Do you in the UK pronounce the "mou" as "moo"?

It's certainly not "mouse"-tache, but it's not easy to give the pronounciation. It's closest to ms (as in Ms Jones), but with an "s" sound rather than an "z".

Sorry for my diversion - back to the main theme. Comments, thoughts, provocations dearly sought.

The example Stuart gives of the destruction of the Sutherland portrait can be matched by a similar act of vandalism against a painting by Walter Sickert, which a writer wantonly destroyed to prove her ludicrous assertion that Sickert was actually Jack the Ripper!

Perhaps its time to introduce a law making it illegal to intentionally destroy or deface a work of art.

How about all the fig leaves affixed to classical statuary?