Le Corbusier

Le Corbusier, by a will dated June 16, 1965, instituted the Foundation Le Corbusier as universal legatee.

The Foundation is therefore invested with the patrimonial and moral rights to the entirety of Le Corbusier’s work.

As such, any reproduction of buildings, plastic works, furniture, or texts by Le Corbusier must be requested in advance to the Foundation and the ADACP (Society of Authors in the Graphic and Plastc Arts) to whom the Foundation has entrusted the management of its intellectual property rights.

Copyright confers two types of rights :

• Moral rights, which protect the non-economic interests of the author.
• The economic rights that allow the owner of the rights to receive a remuneration for the exploitation of his works by third parties.

Copyright is an “immaterial” right, independent of the property right on the work.

The moral rights is a specificity of the French copyright.
It is attached to the author and then to his heirs and, apart from a few exceptions, does not belong to the owners of the works, museums, suppliers of photographs.

It has two prerogatives :

• The right to authorship. It is the right for the author to see his name associated with each exploitation of his work.
• The right to respect of the work. It can be claimed by the author or his successors in title who ensure that the exploitation of the work respects its integrity.

The moral rights, contrary to the patrimonial rights, is perpetual, inalienable and imprescriptible.
It can be exercised at any time by the author or his successors in title, including after the 70 years post mortem of exercise of the economic rights. The moral rights are not transferable. The author can exercise it even if he or she is bound by contrat to a production company or a publishing house. The moral rights are also permanent; it does not fall into the public domain.

Property rights

Unlike the moral rights which are permanent and inalienable, the property rights are limited (70 year after the death of the author) and can be transferred to a third party.

They give the author or his heirs the exclusive right to exploit his work in any form and to receive remuneration for this reproduction.

The right of reproduction covers any reproduction, total or partial, two or three dimensions.

Other rights

There are also rights of adaptation and translation of the work: these rights always require the prior authorization of the author or his successors in title.

The Foundation Le Corbusier, Paris, it the owner of a series of trademarks, registered at the French, European and International levels, which protect the use of the name Le Corbusier.