Famous Protest Art Group in Bulgaria Paint Their Feelings About New EU Copyright Law on Gutenberg Statue

The brave new path to a gatekeeper-manned, non-open internet the EU recently cut with its plainly atrocious new copyright directive was, were you to believe the general media coverage, cheered on by EU artists as a blow to Google and a boon to art because... well, nobody can actually explain that last part. And that's likely because the proposed new legislation, Article 11 and Article 13, essentially forces internet platforms to play total copyright cops or be liable for infringement while gutting the fair use type allowances that had previously been in place. Much of the European legislation that existed on the national level, and which served as the basis for this continental legislation, has done absolutely zero to provide artists or journalists any additional income. Instead, it's re-entrenched legacy gatekeepers and essentially created a legal prohibition on innovation. As the directive goes through its final stages for adoption by EU member states, the general coverage has repeated the line that artists and creators are cheering this on.

But, despite the media coverage, it isn't true that all of the artistic world is blind to exactly what was just done to the internet and the wider culture. Destructive Creation -- a collection of artists most famous for taking a monument in Europe to Soviet soldiers and painting them all as western superheroes and cultural icons -- has made its latest work an addition to a statue of Johannes Gutenberg.

"Let there be light", reads the cover of the Bible held by the bronze hands of Johannes Gutenberg, inventor of the modern printing press, on the famous statue in Place Gutenberg in Strasbourg, France. Last weekend, however, the monument received a curious addition. A dazzling red sign reads CENSORED...