Help me find the origin/artist of this Kraken and ship print?
December 9, 2016 10:44 AM   Subscribe

I recently purchased a tapestry version of an amazing two-color print of a octopus/kraken attacking a ship. But I'm seeing piece of this print used on other homegoods sites so obviously this is not the retailer's original image, and I'd prefer to purchase goods from the original artist. Also the hunt for the source is irresistible.

I got this throw for our guest room (with starry navy curtains we're going for a unsettling Lovecraftian feel for our unwitting sleepers-over.) But it's nasty polyester and I'm returning it. The retailer is "Ambesonne."

I saw the same print reused, with everything removed except for the tentacles, on this retailer's ("Ink and Rags") site.

Now I had no doubt that the print was not the first retailer's original image, or both retailers are the same, but when I saw the second item I was filled with an anger by proxy about the reuse of this image. So with an ulterior motive of still being able to purchase this as a blanket or duvet, I want to track down the original image and hopefully the artist. If the artist can't be tracked down, I'd settle for a high-res image from which I could have a custom duvet printed.

I don't want to communicate with either of these retailers.

I've googled and google image search by upload'd the fuck out of this and am now in a perpetual scroll through DeviantArt.
I created an Imgur post with a few images of the items cropped down to the print.
posted by Sayuri. to Media & Arts (5 answers total) 2 users marked this as a favorite
 
Best answer: The throw image that you linked to looks like several different images combined into one. The octopus part of the image is licensed through Shutterstock, for example, and credited to one Merfin.

Perhaps the other bits of the image are available through Shutterstock, too?
posted by Hellgirl at 11:05 AM on December 9, 2016


Best answer: On Shutterstock, the copyright is claimed by "Merfin," an illustrator from Ukraine. It's entirely possible that the companies to whose products you linked licensed it properly.
posted by brianogilvie at 11:06 AM on December 9, 2016


Threadless has a similar (but not the same) image available for printing on a variety of items, and the image is credited to a specific artist, if you decide you want to go the "support a specific artist " route.
posted by msbubbaclees at 11:11 AM on December 9, 2016


Response by poster: Holy crap you guys, thank you for pointing me towards Shutterstock. Mind blown that this was a composite, but when I stare hard enough I see it now.

I did find the ship part of the image!

I may end up going with Threadless as suggested or Society6 for a more direct purchase but this has been driving me crazy for a month. Thanks again!
posted by Sayuri. at 11:28 AM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]


Image theft is a huge problem and a lot of the Amazon-based sellers you find may have just copied someone else's work. A friend who also does Lovecraft-based/weird woodcuts just recently found over two dozen copyright infringements of her work on Amazon. I'm lucky in that I print my HPL stuff on to wood which makes it harder to swipe the images, but I have had a few confusing requests for clean scans of my work for reasons that were never quite clear beyond "I want to steal your work and not pay you for it."
posted by robocop is bleeding at 8:50 AM on December 10, 2016


« Older Talk me into a trip to Zurich in Jan/Feb   |   Help Plan An Imperial Whistle Stop Newer »
This thread is closed to new comments.