It was a British gallery, and the British law that applies does indeed extend copyright to the act of making exact copies. * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nati

It was a British gallery, and the British law that applies does indeed extend copyright to the act of making exact copies. * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Portrait_Gallery_and_Wikimedia_Foundation_copyright_dispute https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Portrait_Gallery_and_... People who defend the legal position with "But it's creative effort!" do not quite understand the test that applies, and are not actually explaining things correctly. The legal test in British law is whether it is original, the qualifiation that is used in the legislation itself, and there have been a few landmark cases in the 20th century where originality most definitely did not mean creativity. Indeed, it is one of the little-mentioned problems with BrExit that it has quite drastic effects on copyright law, as some of the legal tests that apply derive from EU Court of Justice decisions that may or may not continue to have force. It has been opined by some that the so-called "Infopaq" standard may cease to be applied by British courts, which may revert to older, lower, thresholds for originality. * https://www.cipil.law.cam.ac.uk/virtual-museum https://www.cipil.law.cam.ac.uk/virtual-museum * https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1988/48/section/1 https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1988/48/section/1