Tuesday Trouble

So here's the tally for Monday:

New pages written: 6 (goal: 6.2 pages per day)
Old pages revised on paper: 0
Pages of revisions typed in: 0
Pages lost or gained due to revisions: 0
Total page count to date: 97 (goal: 200)
Days remaining until D-day: still haven't counted. It's over a month and a half away which seems so far away right now.

Emails from editor in UK: 0
Emails from agent in NY: 0

Chocolate consumed: Chocolate coin
Junk food consumed: Chocolate donut
Exercise: none
Television watched: 30 minutes of the live version of A Year Without A Santa Clause
Tears: none

So I'm the kind of person who follows the rules. I believe the adage, "it never hurts to ask," especially when it comes to researching a novel.

Well, in this case it did hurt. I had emailed an art museum asking some questions back in early November. I got a reply yesterday telling me they do not provide assistance for works of fiction nor would they permit a reality TV show to be filmed there. They also said "we actively exercise our rights in our name and site, particularly if we believe a work of fiction infringes on those rights." I replied telling them how I had used the museum in the scene and would change the name of the museum thinking that would be enough.

This morning I received another email (this time cc'd to two other people internal to the museum) telling me I cannot use anything that would imply their name in my book including the names of artwork displayed there or the tram to the museum. The last thing I want to do is infringe on anyone's "copyright and trademark infringement" as was stated in today's email. Legal fees are not part of our household budget.

So instead of writing my new pages, I went back to the first three chapters. I took out the three pieces of artwork that made up the race clue, rewrote a new clue with three fictional pieces of art and changed the setting to the now fictional Art Center. I also rewrote the scene removing anything that might suggest the new setting is anything like the old one. I took out the incredible view of the mountains to the ocean, the beautiful travertine stone architecture, the four pine trees greeting visitors and the named gallery that housed two of the named art pieces. It's a bummer, because the clue was a really good one that I was proud of and the setting absolutely perfect. But what's a writer going to do?

I have to wonder what would have happened had I not emailed them asking those questions especially since I eventually found the answer to one of them myself. Would my Harlequin novel had flown under the radar after its publication or would the museum have "actively" exercised their rights when the book was published? And if so, what would that have meant? If anything I've realized I don't know enough about Fair Use or copyright law and have added that to my To Do list.

I wonder how other writers deal with this. Dan Brown comes to mind. Did he ever have this problem with all the artwork and places he used when he wrote Da Vinci Code? Or did he just not ask?