Nam June Paik’s Video Art from the Perspective of Copyright Law - Conflict between the Artist’s Right of Integrity and the Owner/Curator’s Interpretation -

Abstract

Among art works, video art, which not only contains formative and pictorial elements, but also adds technology, occupies a unique genre as one of contemporary art in art history. As one of the pioneers, Nam June Paik’s video art is exhibited in Korea’s leading art museums, such as MMCA and SeMA. Before and after his death, there was controversy over whether the video material was arbitrarily changed by the exhibitor (), or the replacement of the CRT that was turned off due to old age or malfunction and how to repair it (). With the artist’s death not knowing exactly what his intentions were, the resulting conflict was thrown into the discussion of the art world. Even though there is a copyright element in these conflicts, it is a pity that copyright experts were not involved in the conflict resolution process, or that there was a copyright discussion about it from outside. In this regard, this paper is not without a sense of delay, but it is hoped that it will provide some legal guidance in this conflict that is likely to recur in the future.