Supreme Court: BKAVE Prohibited from Using "Mark Gonzales" Angel Design

American artist Mark Gonzales has won his final victory in a copyright lawsuit against the Korean fashion company BKAVE.

Supreme Court, Seocho-gu, Seoul.

According to the legal community on August 11, the First Division of the Supreme Court (Presiding Justice Noh Taeak) upheld the lower court's partial ruling in favor of Mark Gonzales in his copyright infringement lawsuit against BKAVE.

Since 2018, BKAVE has launched a clothing brand named after Mark Gonzales and used his bird-shaped design (the Angel figure) as its main logo. BKAVE had entered into a sublicense agreement with Japan’s Sakura International, which held the license for the Mark Gonzales name and the Angel figure, allowing BKAVE to sell related products in Korea until December 2020.

The issue arose in 2021 when, even after the licensing agreement between Sakura International and Gonzales had ended, BKAVE continued to sell products under a new brand name, "What Is In," in the same manner as before. In response, Gonzales filed a lawsuit, claiming that BKAVE had infringed his copyright by continuing to use his design after the license agreement had expired.

The court of first instance ruled partially in favor of the plaintiff, stating, "BKAVE must not manufacture or sell products containing some of Gonzales's drawings and signatures, and must dispose of all such products." The appellate court upheld this first-instance ruling.

The Supreme Court also found no fault in the lower court's judgment and dismissed appeals from both parties. The bench stated, "There was no error in the lower court’s judgment that would have affected the outcome, such as misunderstanding the legal principles regarding creative forms of expression, failing to sufficiently examine substantial similarity, or violating the rules of logic and experience and thereby exceeding the limits of free evaluation of evidence."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.