JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) – An Alaskan native cultural organization and the luxury department store Neiman Marcus have resolved a lawsuit over the sale of a coat with a copyrighted geometric design borrowed from indigenous culture.
The Sealaska Heritage Institute said in a statement on Wednesday that both sides, including 10 other defendants named in addition to Neiman Marcus, agreed to the terms “to resolve all disputes between them under US and Tlingit laws,” reported the KTOO Public Media.
The Juneau-based institute is the cultural arm of Sealaska Corp., Alaska’s native corporation for the Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian peoples of southeastern Alaska.
In the federal lawsuit filed in April 2020, the institute maintained that the Dallas-based retailer falsely linked the $ 2,555 “Ravenstail” coat to artists native to the northwestern coast of California to Alaska through the design and use of the term Ravenstail. Sealaska said he found that the retailer was selling the jacket in 2019.
The institute in its lawsuit said that Ravenstail’s term and style had been associated for hundreds of years with the Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian tribes. According to the lawsuit, the coat also mimics a Ravenstail cloak created by a Tlingit weaver nearly a quarter of a century ago.
The lawsuit claims that Neiman Marcus violated the Indian Arts and Crafts Act, which requires that products marketed as “Indians” are, in fact, made by indigenous people.
Neither Neiman Marcus nor his Alaska-based lawyers involved in the lawsuit responded immediately to emails from The Associated Press seeking comment.
Sealaska said the Neiman Marcus cloak violates the copyright of Clarissa Rizal, a master weaver who created the Ravenstail cloak in 1996. When she died in 2016, her family obtained the rights to the cloak, said Sealaska’s lawyer, Jacob Adams.
In 2019, Rizal’s heirs registered the mantle at the United States copyright office, the suit says. The copyright was then licensed exclusively to Sealaska.
Adams told public radio station Juneau that the terms of the agreement are confidential, but that some effects of it may become public.
“There are conditions that are being met to meet the aspect of the Tlingit law and the aspect of cultural requirements,” said Adams. “So, in the future, some things can be seen as a result of the agreement.”
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This story corrects Neiman Marcus’ spelling.