Colebrook man wants to ARM artists with more rights

COLEBROOK — Town resident Steve Lehman, a photographer and conceptual artist, is trying to get people to fight for their artistic rights.Lehman is the organizer for the local branch of the Artists’ Rights Movement (ARM), a national organization dedicated to improving artists’ rights of ownership over their works.ARM has more than 30 branches in 16 states with three branches in Connecticut.Lehman said artists include anyone who creates art — painters, writers, photographers, filmmakers, musicians and online artists. “If you look at the way the laws are when it comes to art, it favors large businesses over individuals and small businesses,” Lehman said. “It’s a huge problem across the board. We need a group like ARM because if people don’t act now, everything will be controlled by a few individual big companies.”According to Lehman, one of the primary missions of ARM is to strengthen laws to protect artists.“A lot of artist’s rights are being stolen without them even knowing it,” Lehman said. He urged artists to read the terms of service of social networking sites very carefully before posting their work online.Another mission of ARM is to improve working conditions for artists, which Lehman said is close to his heart.“The working conditions for photographers are hard,” he said. “In professional photography, when they get you to jump so high, it’s never high enough. The hours are long and the pay is not what you would expect.”The third mission for ARM is to increase governmental funding for the arts, which Lehman said is a big problem in today’s economic conditions.“The perception in America is, ‘Arts, so what?’” Lehman said. “If you do research, arts can give benefits to communities, both economically and socially. For example, in New York City, there is so much economic opportunity when it comes to arts. In a small community like Winsted, where not much is going on, you need cultural events for these things to happen.”And finally, Lehman said ARM is dedicated to protecting the freedom of speech of all artists.“When the government finds ways to take away the ability of artists to make a living, that is a threat to free speech,” Lehman said.For more information on the ARM, visit meetup.com/artistsrights.

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