Copyright and Rights and Restrictions Information
This guide contains general information about rights and restrictions for materials held by the Prints & Photographs Division, as well as specific rights statements for some collections, artists, and organizations.
The Library of Congress, as a publicly supported institution, does not own rights to material in its collections. Therefore, it does not charge permission fees for use of such material and cannot give or deny permission to publish or otherwise distribute material in its collections.
It is your obligation to determine and satisfy copyright or other use restrictions (such as donor restrictions, privacy rights, publicity rights, licensing and trademarks) when publishing or otherwise distributing materials found in the Division's collections. We try to supply as much information as we have, but sometimes, key information is lacking, and ultimately you know how you plan to use the material and the level of risk with which you are comfortable.
Information about rights to images included in the Prints and Photographs Online Catalog is supplied through one or more means, if such information is known. In a field labeled “Rights Advisory,” you may see a statement saying:
"No known restrictions on publication." This is often the best that we can say, meaning there are no donor restrictions and as far as we can tell, no copyright restriction is in effect. For further information about the use of this phrase, see this explanation in our rights overview document. You can include "no known restrictions" in your search string in hopes of locating images that have that rights advisory.
“Publication may be restricted.” Often this statement is followed by a link to a statement about rights and restrictions pertaining to works by particular artists or from particular organizations or collections. These statements are collected on P&P's "Rights and Restrictions Information" page. It is worth double-checking this page for a rights statement, just in case it isn’t linked from the catalog record.
“Rights not evaluated” means that P&P staff may not have reviewed what is known about the rights of a given item or collection. Double-check for a relevant rights statement on our "Rights and Restrictions Information" page. If there is not one listed there, you will need to assess the rights. General information about image rights and tips for assessing them can be found in the Prints and Photographs Division's online brochure, "Copyright and Other Restrictions That Apply to Publication / Distribution of Images: Assessing the Risk of Using a P&P Image". This includes guidance about doing your own risk evaluation.