The estate of band Nirvana is suing fashion designer Marc Jacobs, along with Saks and Neiman Marcus, for copyright infringement following the release of their “Redux Grunge” collection.
The collection was created to pay tribute to the infamous grunge era and features a t-shirt using the iconic Nirvana smiley face logo. Jacobs filed a notice of dismissal, arguing that the copyright for the artwork covers the entire t-shirt design, with changes to the logo including the eyes of the smiley face being replaced with letters “MJ”, and “Nirvana” replaced with the word “Heaven.”
The claims against Jacobs is that the use of Nirvana’s copyrighted logo was unauthorised, and their wrongful actions threaten to dilute the value of Nirvana’s licenses and violates their rights in numerous ways. The claim also extends to the marketing of the line, with Saks and Neiman Marcus joined for selling the allegedly infringing items.
So will Marc Jacobs soon be all apologies?