The Random creature

July 22

The following message I received from Roza of Shovava (also on Etsy): Dear Clare,

As you know, I am an artist from Australia. On September 29th, 2012 I have created Wings design, the same one you have featured on your blog. It was painstakingly hand painted and digitally printed onto scarves. To my surprise, this particular design has been extremely successful. Orders were coming faster than I could produce these scarves.

It was also featured by massive blogs such as BoredPanda.com and other blogs followed: http://www.boredpanda.com/bird-wing-scarves-shovava-roza-khamitova/ What surprised me even more is how fast my design was blatantly copied by many manufacturers in China and possibly other countries.

It is now sold on many online platforms without my consent. I thought this happens to massive brands like Prada or Luis Vitton, not someone small like me.

I can’t begin to tell you how much time I have spent on contacting Taobao, AliExpress, Alibaba, SGshop, Tmall, GHgate, Amazon, Ebay and even Etsy pleading them to take down IP infringing items. In most cases I was ignored, in some cases the items were removed much later, meanwhile these thieves are thriving and creating more colorways of my design in no time.

Recently I found a massive US based company called “Charming Charlie” selling my wings scarf they obviously bought from one of the cheap Chinese manufactures – now my design is being sold all over USA in over 280 physical shops, not just online.

I know, some can say…Move on! Don’t spend your energy on this…you should be Creating instead of doing this… and while its partially true, I feel as though that if nothing is done, if these people go unpunished, then more artists will suffer. Also, I can’t stand the thought that these thieves make massive profits on someone else’s hard work.

I have been battling these counterfeit shops for a long time now. Needless to say, it has taken a huge toll on me emotionally and creatively. After seeing all the copycats, I felt like I am competing against myself, so I created a whole new, stunning Wings design but sadly, I am scared to release it to the public, as I am scared that it will be stolen right away. I don’t think anyone, including my partner who has been by my side all this time, can completely understand the impact of this situation on me. I feel so hopeless. I know, that I should be able to separate emotions and business, but in this case it is not solely just business for me, it is my creativity, my life. I consider it worse than stealing…an artist puts his whole heart and soul into a piece, it is product of his whole life, a lifetime of work, developing skills and intuition to create this piece or pieces. And someone them it in a matter of hours all just to make a quick profit. What’s worse is that they are using My photos, even photos of my painting process they stole from my facebook page, and they are using my name and Logo. By “them” I mean hundreds and hundreds of shops! The problem also is that there is no “Shovava” brand awareness, where people can say “this is original’ and “this is a copy”. Most copies look cheap and terrible. As a result, it makes me look bad, because these thieves state that the designer is “Roza Khamitova”. So as you can see, not only my art was stolen, but also my identity. My design is registered in Australia, it is also recently been registered in China. We are looking to register it in other countries. But even with all legal documents in place, I am not able to take all these shops down.

I desperately need help. I feel as though only through social media I will be able to make some change. Please, if you or your followers can help in any way, I would be so, so grateful. Whether its publicly shaming Infringers, or getting some legal advice…any artillery against these criminals is welcome. Sincerely Yours, -Roza Khamitova

It’s the inclusion of Storm. (Storm? Pretty sure that’s Storm.) And in a way where, yes, representation saves lives.

See, here’s a weird medical fact: black women are more likely to get breast cancer and nobody knows why. It’s a medical mystery. Now, I want you to do a fun exercise: tell me the last time you saw a breast cancer awareness campaign that included black women. Go on, I’ll wait. Speaking as someone active with the cause whose aunt is even more active with the cause, here’s my answer: In eight years of working for awareness across four states, I have never seen a single black woman in any breast cancer campaign. Ever.

Black women are also more likely to die of breast cancer because they’re less likely to catch it early. That’s not genetics, that’s math. The sooner you begin treatment, the better your prognosis. Black women are less likely to know how to do self-exams and because of the socioeconomic divide, less likely to see an OB/GYN annually. And they’re ignored by awareness campaigns.