Article 14 National Implementations Overview

The Article 14 National Implementations Overview provides information about the specificities of how European Union member states and some European Economic Area countries have brought article 14 of the Copyright in the Digital Single Market (CDSM) Directive into their national legislation. It seeks to support legal practitioners, openGLAM activists and cultural heritage professionals in having a better understanding of the transposition of article 14 and its practical impact.

To navigate this overview, click on the country that you need information on: Austria (RR) | Belgium | Bulgaria | Croatia | Cyprus* | Czechia | Denmark (RR) | Estonia | Finland (RR) | France | Germany (RR) | Greece | Hungary | Iceland (RR)* | Ireland* | Italy (RR) | Latvia | Lithuania* | Luxembourg | Malta | Netherlands | Norway (RR) | Poland | Portugal | Romania | Slovakia | Slovenia* | Spain (RR) | Sweden (RR)

  • Overview

    • Task Force reviewers: Name of person monitoring the country’s developments, email address

    • ‘Other photographs’ related rights: Yes or No. This field signals whether a country has existing related rights protections for “other photographs” that are not original in the sense they are the author’s own intellectual creation

    • Overview: An overview of any Article 14 implementation activities (or a lack of them)

    • Scope: Whether works of visual arts is defined and/or the scope of public domain works affected

    • Retroactivity: Whether the provisions apply retroactively

  • Statutory law

    • Provision on copyright: Any pre-implementation statutory text in the source language that relates to copyright in artwork reproductions (in source language and in English).

    • Revised provision on copyright: Any revised text in the source language, or NA if no revisions (in source language and in English).

    • Comments/analysis: Comments or analysis on the above.

    • Provision on related rights for “other photographs”: Any pre-implementation statutory text in the source language that relates to related rights protection of non-original photography (in source language and in English).

    • Comment/analysis: Commens or analysis on the above.

  • Case Law

    • Originality in photography: Include information about court cases that have established the copyright or related rights protection of a photograph (in source language and in English).

  • Takeaways

    • Limitations for CHIs: Use this field to note limitations on cultural heritage institutions who may wish to interpret Article 14 as broadly as possible, e.g., to apply to any public domain works rather than only “works of visual art” or stronger recognition of photographers’ rights that may be unassignable or unwaivable.

    • Reflections: Summarise the key takeaways or other information useful for CHIs.

    • Sources: Add any helpful sources for understanding or tracking national developments.

  • OpenGLAM examples

RR indicates that the country recognises related rights for non-original photography. An asterisk * indicates that no or little information is available for that country. If you have any information, please reach out to copyright@europeana.eu.

Article 14 brought a legal opportunity to safeguard the public domain. This article establishes that ‘when the term of protection of a work of visual art has expired, any material resulting from an act of reproduction of that work is not subject to copyright or related rights, unless the material resulting from that act of reproduction is original in the sense that it is the author's own intellectual creation’. In other words, no neighbouring rights for ‘other photographs’ can be claimed on reproductions of public domain works of visual arts.

This overview is just one of a number of resources we have available to support professionals working with copyright and digital cultural heritage. Discover them all on Europeana Pro, and read more about article 14 of the CDSM Directive in this article and in this page.

This overview has been prepared and is maintained by the Article 14 Task Force, which is part of the Copyright Community at the Europeana Network Association. It is therefore created with input from cultural heritage professionals based in various countries. We cannot guarantee the correctness of all of the information contained in this overview, so we recommend using it as general guidance and a first reference point to look for more information.