Moschino stole my graffiti, a Brooklyn-based artist complains in a new lawsuit that name-drops Katy Perry and Gigi Hadid and demands cash compensation from the fashion house for the theft of the tagger’s “street cred.”
Well-known graffiti artist “Rime” is suing the luxury Italian designer, saying it ripped off his signature style, as well as his actual signature — or “tag.”
Moschino never got Rime’s permission to emblazon the tag and a blatant copy of his design on its strapless black gowns, complains the artist, whose given name is Joseph Tierney.
The gowns debuted in February on a Milanese runway, modeled by supermodel Hadid, the California federal lawsuit says.
Then, in May, Moschino paid Perry to wear the gown at the high-profile Met Gala — “obnoxiously” and calculatingly drumming up publicity because attendees had been instructed “to stay within the museum’s Chinese exhibition theme.”
Moschino designer Jeremy Scott also wore the designs on a customized jacket. “Not only did Ms. Perry and Defendant Scott advertise, wear and display the clothing at the event, they arrived at the event in a spray-painted Rolls-Royce and even carried around Moschino-branded cans of fake spray paint during the event, as if Defendants were responsible for the artwork,” the suit says.
“His credibility as a graffiti artist was compromised by inclusion in such a crass and commercial publicity stunt,” the lawsuit huffs.
Rime created the design, titled “Vandal Eyes,” for a Detroit street-art foundation in 2012, the suit says.
“I don’t know what they were thinking,” Rime’s attorney, David Eriksen, told The Post.
“The commercialism of the use negatively impacts his credibility. It trivializes his work. If anyone in the artistic community within his own genre was to think he licensed that, he’s open to charges of selling out.”
Moschino and Scott did not respond to requests for comment on the case.
Tierney’s work has appeared at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles.
