Wendy Marani, plagiarist

Medusa’s Gimps: as plagiarised by Wendy Marani (left) as painted by Nancy Farmer (right)

Being the story of one Wendy Marani, a.k.a Wendy Marani Hall, a.k.a. the Evil Plagiarist, and how she got her ideas.

What is this page for?

For those who have not already encountered this story (and there are many who have, thanks to a lot of wonderful friends and supporters), this page is a summary, bringing together links to all of the posts about Wendy Marani that I have written to date (scroll down to find those). It also acts as a landing page for the domains http://www.wendymarani.com and http://www.wendymaranihall.com. That is in the hope that, if enough people link to this page, it will be high enough in the search engine results that it will be difficult for any potential customers of Ms Marani’s who google her name to fail to notice what she is doing.

medusa in Venus’ Bedroom: as plagiarised by Wendy Marani (left) as painted by Nancy Farmer (right)

Who is Wendy Marani?

Wendy Marani, or sometimes Wendy Marani Hall, and even sometimes just Wendy Hall, is a brazen and talentless plagiarist. In particular she has targeted my Medusa paintings, though she may also have targeted the work of other artists as well. In case, from the look of the pictures, you suspect that I may be mercilessly attacking a child, her age is variously given as 41, 47 and 55, and she also claims to be an ex-playboy model and a law graduate.

Many artists are influenced by each other, it is unavoidable, it stimulates creation, and may often take an artist down hitherto unexpected creative pathways. I have absolutely no problem with this. It is polite to give another artist credit where appropriate, but even that is not always possible or appropriate, because we all pick up ideas from all around us.

What Wendy Mariani is doing however, is quite different. She is making much of ‘her Medusa Series of paintings’, she is attempting to sell them online, and she is insisting that she is the author of these ideas. She has also, at time of writing, ignored my requests for her to remove the paintings, except in the one case where an online gallery has given her the ultimatum that she remove them or be removed from their site entirely, and even then she tried first to move them into her husband, Don Hall’s gallery on the same site before she was spotted.

Don Hall, her husband, is also a painter. I know nothing of his integrity, or even his views on this matter. I do not know if he owns the copyright of the photos that he used for his art, but since they are mainly sportsmen and celebrities they do not affect me. All I can say is that he describes himself as “widely regarded as the premier sports and entertainment artist in the U.S. today”. Since I do not live in the US, I am offering no views on this artist.

Wendy Marani is another matter. She clearly believes, because I am in the UK and she is in Florida, that there is nothing I can do about her use of my images. Hence this page. If you would like to aid me in this stand against this woman, and plagiarism in general, feel free to link to this page, using the name Wendy Marani Hall in the text with the link, and, for best effect, also inserting ‘art’ or ‘paintings’ and so on as a few descriptive words abut the link.

I would be interested to hear any similar stories you may have – just leave me a comment.

Bathtime: as plagiarised by Wendy Marani (left) as painted by Nancy Farmer (right)

The Blog Posts

My art is all about stories, fairytales, and a satirical slant on things, and I do not personally like to read a lot of whining and complaining, however justified, so the original blog posts were written in a style which amused me, and, I hoped, would entertain others. And part of the reason for this is that I feel if people are entertained by something they are more likely to pass the story on.

So here they are in all their mock 15th or maybe 16th century dignity 😉

Part One – in which is announced the finding, but not (in the original form of the post) the identity of the Evil Plagiarist:
https://nancyfarmer.wordpress.com/2013/03/08/the-artist-the-plagiarist-and-the-medusa-paintings/
Part Two – in which it is discovered that the Evil Plagiarist intends to continue her evil work:
https://nancyfarmer.wordpress.com/2013/03/09/the-artist-the-plagiarist-and-the-medusa-paintings-part-2/
Part Three – in which lies are repeated, excuses are given, and a game is invented:
https://nancyfarmer.wordpress.com/2013/03/13/the-artist-the-plagiarist-and-the-medusa-paintings-part-3/
Part Four – in which we take the pants off Don Hall, tabloid style!
https://nancyfarmer.wordpress.com/2013/03/17/don-halls-secret-shame/
Part Five – in which we learn what else Wendy has been up to, or NOT been up to:
https://nancyfarmer.wordpress.com/2013/04/01/wendy-marani-the-love-rat-of-plagiarism/

And the article in my local paper:
http://www.thisissomerset.co.uk/Central-Somerset-artist-plagiarism-battle/story-18392299-detail/story.html#axzz2NL1Ls8uW

Why no Litigation?

It is expensive, and it would probably get me nowhere. Unleashing the power of the Internet, however, is a fun and free activity and  everyone can join in! It is also very, very public, and may serve to teach more than one person a lesson.

There will no doubt be more added to this page in due course. In the meantime, happy reading, please pass this on or link to it if you’ve a mind to help me, and here’s hoping that Wendy Marani rues the day she thought she could ignore me!

sincerely,

Nancy Farmer 🙂