Black Eyes For Crystal Castles Over Use Of Artist's Madonna Image

04/24/08 4:30pm

Toronto electro-punk duo Crystal Castles are in the midst of a heated dispute over artwork they've used on T-shirts, the cover of their "Alice Practice" seven-inch and the limited-edition "banned" version of their self-titled full-length debut.

The graphic in question features a drawing of Madonna with a battered eye that Crystal Castles' Ethan Kath and Alice Glass claim they found on a flyer two years ago. The work wasn't credited, so they started using it. Group manager Mikey Apples told Torontoist.com that "it was their hope that the artist might reveal themselves and make contact with the band."

When artist Trevor Brown (who first published the image in a 1999 book titled A Temple Of Blasphemy) found out what was happening in 2006, he says he contacted Glass via e-mail about being remunerated for his work. Brown says he originally asked for $300 for the single cover, and claims the band agreed, but says he never received it. He also alleges that he requested another $300 for his drawing's use on the T-shirts, but dropped it in return for Crystal Castles' halting production of them — which they didn't. Brown says he provided the group with his PayPal information to make the transaction easier, but that didn't help.

Apples counters that the duo reached an agreement with Brown regarding payment, but that the artist didn't respond to numerous requests for his mailing address.

"With no replies, no contact, and no apparent objection from the artist, the band continued to use the image with full artist info and credit on the good faith that the original agreement would be upheld unless notified otherwise and the opportunity to compensate the artist would happen eventually at his convenience," he told the website.

Brown detailed his account of things in a Feb. 17 entry on his blog, and numerous updates and reader comments followed.

Brown added fuel to the fire by raising his compensation demand to $10,000. The two sides apparently agreed on a lower figure, but Brown was offered a contract that would have forced him to sign over the rights to his creation to Crystal Castles. He declined, and went on the attack in another blog post.

"I give up! — their greed is obviously far greater than mine — let them keep 'their' dirty money — i’m completely sick of this — i do not wish to spend the rest of my life arguing with idiots — already months of my precious time has been wasted over this," wrote Brown on March 26.

Apples insists that his clients still want to clear things up with Brown, and told Torontoist.com that "we remain hopeful that eventually we can come to an agreement with the artist for retroactive compensation or otherwise and put this issue behind us."

The dispute has now caught the attention of Mountain Goats main man John Darnielle, who wrote about it on his blog and opened his post with this: "Sure, they made one of my favorite albums of the year so far, but — not to put too fine a point on it — Crystal Castles can go to Hell and stay there."