Copyright Information:

Blanket Statement:

All of our images are copyright © Rusty and Ingrid Creative Company, all rights reserved, and may not be copied or used in any form, without permission.

“Vintage Style” (Not Vintage):

Though our designs may look like vintage artwork, they are not old, and they are not in the public domain. We intentionally reference historic styles and printing methods when we create our designs to create a “vintage style”, but we don’t copy other artists. The oldest designs we sell, we personally created, starting in 2013.

All of our images are original, hand-drawn artwork, created by Rusty Kinnunen and Ingrid Kinnunen, and as such, they are the intellectual property of us, the artists. We do not source our images from other artists or from the public domain; we do not do custom designs for hire; and we do not print other artist’s work on contract.

Only Handmade Fine Art Screen Prints:

Since the beginning of our company in 2013, we have only produced our designs in our own home and studio as hand drawn, hand-printed, hand-signed and numbered (in pencil below the image), limited edition screen prints, printed on 100% cotton fine art paper. (We mean this—we have never printed digital prints of our designs). We have also held true to our limited editions, having closed out about twenty editions since they’ve sold out.

Evidence of Our Creation of the Designs:

We are intentionally very transparent about our design integrity and working methods. It is a primary virtue of our brand. Our studio is open to the public, seven days a week at 11 Main Street, Rockport, Massachusetts, for anyone to visit and see how we create our artwork.

Evidence of our creation of our own designs is easy to find if you scroll through the history of our company on Instagram. We have documented nearly every design as we have created them going back to 2013, when we were building our business in our home. Here’s the link: https://www.instagram.com/rustyandingrid/

Licensing:

We do not, and have never licensed our designs to be used by anyone else. This means that if you see our designs printed digitally on paper, or on wood, or on t-shirts, or merchandise, or used in digital media or any other form besides what we produce in our studio, then it means someone has stolen our designs and is illegally using our intellectual property. This is piracy, and we will prosecute them to defend our rights.

Nowadays it is very easy to find images online and digitally print them on any number of products to sell. This is unethical, illegal, unoriginal hack work and we would never condone this type of business. To avoid confusion, since the beginning, we have avoided digital printing or mass-production of our designs altogether.

How do you know that you have an original Rusty+Ingrid?

Our goal is to create beautiful, original, hand-made artwork that has integrity. We intentionally limit our production methods and print editions, so that our prints are easy to authenticate. It is easy to know our work because we only make one thing: Handmade Fine Art Screen Prints. Any other use of our images is piracy.

Here’s what to look for:

  • You bought it from our booth at a craft fair market (only in New England), from our website, from us in person at our studio in Rockport, or from one of our very few resellers (L.L.Bean in Freeport, ME; New England Ski Museum; and a few others).

  • ALL of our prints are signed and numbered below the artwork in pencil, personally signed by Rusty or Ingrid Kinnunen, along with the year printed.

  • It is a hand-printed screen print (this means than no two prints are exactly alike, and there will be subtle imperfections: colors that don’t quite line up, pinholes in the colors, spotty or heavy ink distribution, etc.)

  • We have only ever printed on one very specific, heavy weight, 100% cotton fine art paper, which is made in USA: (Stonehenge 100, White, 250gsm) produced by Legion Paper, in New York.

    • We have never printed our designs on anything else (not wood, not fabric, not merchandise, etc.)

  • We’ve never used digital printing or mass production printing (offset lithography and the like).

  • We’ve never embroidered our designs on anything.

  • Solid colors: If you look very closely, our colors are made of flat, solid colors, and are not process colors (colors made of a combination of different colored little dots that mix to create the illusion of a color).

  • No gradients or shifts in colors or tone within a color area. No soft, fuzzy edges, and no half-tone dots.

  • The lettering is hand drawn and matches the color and style of the illustration with wavering, irregular (not ruler straight) edges.

  • No more than four colors used in an image (our current limit, although we’ve done up to six on very few designs in the past).

  • Our prints and inks have a very matte, chalky finish. No glossy surfaces on any of our prints.

  • Sizing: We have only sold prints in a few standard sizes (paper dimensions in inches): 5”x7”, 9”x12”, 14”x18”, 18”x24”, and very few 22”x30”.

  • The style and colors of the designs should be consistent with our body of work.

  • If you have doubts, just reach out to us and ask.

Please notify us if you see our designs being used illegally.

We are serious about stopping piracy of our work, not only on principle, and for our own interest, but also to protect the value of the artwork that thousands of collectors have purchased from us.

Contact us directly or use this form to contact us if you have seen our designs being used in a questionable manner.

Thank you,
Rusty and Ingrid Kinnunen