Art Theft

This is a message from one of my favorite artists, Loish:

so, as some of you may know, my artwork has been illegally printed on a sweater and is being sold in numerous webshops in korea. one of them already removed the item; as of now, i only know of two, but there could be more.

a link is here:[link]
please don’t tell me how cute or funny you think this sweater is because hearing that really just makes me feel worse.
[edit] apparently it’s worse than i thought, they are also selling this clothing item with two more drawings of mine printed on them: [link] [/edit]

i am truly exhausted and depressed by all of this. i’ve literally been in tears. i am at a loss for what to do. the fact that this is happening in korea complicates things enormously because a) it’s really far away, b) they have different laws and c) there’s a language barrier. this eliminates all cheap and easy solutions for me, because besides having to find a laywer in holland that can help me out, i’ll also need to hire a korean lawyer. i’m not exactly swimming in money so i have no idea how i will be able to afford this.

i’m going to see what my options are but i’m feeling extremely discouraged and just sad. i don’t know how to defend my rights to this artwork, all i can do is sit here and let these assholes abuse my work and make money off of my efforts. 

anyway, i wrote this journal for two reasons: to let you guys know, maybe you guys can help spread the word. maybe there’s someone out there who’s been through the same thing, or has connections with a korean lawyer. chances are slim but you never know, right?

secondly, to ask if anyone out there speaks korean and can help me figure out what brand this sweater is? since the sweater is being sold in different shops, the webshops are not the ones who made it. i need to find out which company has fabricated these sweaters. it could save me a lot of money if i decide to take legal action, because then i won’t have to hire a lawyer to figure this out for me. so if anyone who speaks korean, or knows someone who speaks korean, could pretend to be a potential buyer of the sweater and inquire as to which brand it is, and ask for the contact information of this brand? any contact information at all would help enormously. 

anyway, i wish i could do more and stand up against this kind of stuff. sitting here and taking it sends out the wrong message to all art thieves, telling them they can just get away with stealing our hard work. i feel a responsibility to send out the right message, but i don’t know how at this moment.

thanks all for reading.