"Walking into the photocopy shop today, an appropriate venue for what was about to ensue, I was confronted with a woman in the queue before me wearing a skirt sporting one of my textile designs. Knowing that I had never sold or produced my design in this form my immediate reaction was one of total shock.

'Fortunately the woman herself was made of stern stuff and agreed to stand on a stool and hold out her garment while I ran off some copies for evidence. The design had been slightly changes and included a ridiculous little doodle which bore no relevance to the other shapes.

'A visit to the shop where the skirt was purchased revealed a name and phone number; I now have to try and pursue the matter to find who is at the bottom of it."

Many artists are faced with similar situations, however they feel helpless to do anything and accept the plagiarism as the finest form of flattery.

In artistic, literary and academic circles accusations of plagiarism may be the 'kiss of death' to a person's professional career, but what does the law consider is plagiarism? Do the legal and dictionary meanings equate? What can textile artists do to protect their creativity and originality? What action can they take if their work is plagiarised?

Plagiarism's dictionary meaning is to take and use another's writings as one's own. The legal aspects of plagiarism are covered by copyright law (an area of Intellectual Property Law); however copyright law protects only the form of expression - it does not protect ideas or concepts. Copyright does not protect an artist who paints a swan against another artist paining a swan, because the swan is the idea and the actual drawing of a swan is the form of expression. Each artist, so long as they do not copy another artist's work can use the idea for their own work.

More specifically the Copyright Act does not define the meaning of plagiarism. The Act merely states that to copy a substantial part of the work, without accreditation of the original work is an infringement of the copyright in the original artistic work. Indirectly, the law by the concept of infringement accepts the basic essence of plagiarism that is it is wrong for a person to claim another's work as their own. Here the artist's work appearing as a skirt may be an infringement of the textile design used on an original scarf.

The court has said the philosophy behind copyright infringement was to prevent a person misappropriating another person's work, skill and effort. For infringement to occur however a substantial part of the person's form of expression must have been taken and used in the new work.

Infringement of copyright is not judged solely on the basis of quantity but also on the basis of quality. If the essential features of the work are copied (for example the specially designed shapes in the scarf), then infringement may occur even though they form a small part of the original work. The test has always been whether a person has copied a substantial part of the original work in a qualitative sense. In our artist's case, taking the squiggles from the design would infringe the copyright in the scarf as these are the essential feature of the work on a qualitative basis. The question of infringement is situation dependant, to be judged on the basis of the case's facts.

How far can the creative works of previous authors be used to inspire, assist, and to give concepts to other people in developing new copyright works? Copyright law recognises a very small level of originality is needed to make a new copyright work. It allows the ideas, and concept expressed by an author to be copied. The level of originality required is that the author has used their own work, skill and effort to change the original work into a new work. It is not enough to say that adding a minor part of an existing textile design is using sufficient work skill and effort to avoid the allegation of infringement of copyright.

Once a qualitative and quantitative assessment had been made, the questions still remain. What rights do Jill and other artists have to protect themselves against such plagiarism?

Three steps of protection exist. First an artist can use the copyright warning, second by preservation of the evidence of creation and third the willingness to make examples of people who infringe your work, though warning letters and even litigation.

Incorporating the international copyright warning into your textile design notifies people that the work is protected by copyright and shouldn't be copied. The warning is the © name of artist and date. The date is an optional issue.

The second step in protection is to keep evidence showing the artist designed the work. This is the evidentiary issue to the ownership of copyright. Any preliminary sketches with dates and initials, proofs or rough showing how you developed the work can be immensely helpful in providing the artist as the original creator.

If plagiarism is suspected then the artist can obtain a copy of the infringing work and keep a record of the date, time and from whom it was purchased or manufactured. Compare the original and copy, and if a substantial similarity exit, then initiate step three: visit a lawyer at the Arts Law Centre to confirm your rights and remedies.

Many artists are unaware of the numerous remedies available to them in a plagiarism case. The Copyright Act gives a number of remedies including an account of the profits made by the infringer from the sale of the infringing item: the right to damages; an injunction to prevent the infringer copying the work again; the right to seize all infringing copies of the work and to obtain the full value of the goods seized. If the evidence is strong enough then a civil search and seizure order can be obtained to prevent infringing copies being sold or destroyed before the infringer gets to know you are on to his/her illegal activities.

Plagiarism is not the highest form of flattery. Artists have the right to protect their work. The law supports originality and creativity. The highest form of flattery is to be accepted as an artist for your creative work. Get wise; the law doesn't accept plagiarism and neither should you.

"Queensland has not a good track record in the copyright stakes. Certain publicised cases and a change in the act have made a slight difference but there is a whole layer of industry which lacks creative ability, knowledge, professionalism and ethical standards. It is the ones with all those qualities who suffer from the presence of this group in society. The law does protect us, but the enforcement of our copyright laws present huge problems.

'The other thing that shocks me is the fact that so few people in our society know anything about copyright, and I include people working in the relevant industries.

'Publicity about copyright has to continue and infringement will not be tolerated. This should be taught at schools. The artslaw Centre of Queensland does a terrific job of giving free legal advice on these matters by extremely experienced solicitors.

'The Australian Copyright council is another source of free help. And NAVA (National Association for the Visual Arts) is in the process of setting up a service called Vi$copy by which people can be taken to court on behalf of clients. Design is our life; and we go to great lengths to do it as well as we can.

'Copyists destroy good reputation, income, years of hard work and integrity of design. And no, I'm not flattered, in response to the person (in industry) who suggested I could see it in that light. Who wants to see their design distorted and printed onto cheap fabric and made into an item it was never intended for?"