In the Calvin and Hobbes cartoons they often make strange sculptures out of snowmen. Yesterday I came across this sculpture outside the humanist faculty at the University of Göteborg.

The scene depicts two figures pushing and pulling a huge wheel over a third figure lying down in the snow in front of the wheel. Check out a larger size at my Flickr account.

On a interesting side note – according to Swedish copyright law only public art which is placed in the public sphere on a permanent/constant basis may be reproduced without permission. An interesting question which needs to be addressed first is: Is this installation/sculpture copyrightable art? The second point is the issue of permanent/constant. It can hardly be considered to be placed there on a permanent basis but could we interpret the word constant to mean for the duration of the snow?

If it is to be seen as impermanent copyrightable art then it may not be reproduced. If the photo is to be seen as permanent copyrightable art the photo may be reproduced, but the creators must be named. Actually this is all a moot point since in neither case can this photo be reproduced on the Internet.

So who says copyright is complicated?