The last five words are underlined for emphasis.
Now, a number of parents are claiming that the teacher offered their children's homework for sale online, without their knowledge — Embellished on nearly 3,000 items, including mugs, ornaments, pillows and shower curtains, priced up to $120.
A legal letter sent to the school board and teacher on Tuesday alleges that the teacher, identified as Mario Peron, included the artwork “without the consent of its creators, in bad faith, and in violation of all laws relating to a school's intellectual property.” artist.”
Joel DeBelfi initiated the legal action after his 13-year-old son, Jax, came home from school one day last week and told him the students found their work for sale while searching the Internet to learn more about their teacher's art.
“This guy basically had his own little baby factory,” DeBelvieu said. “It's crazy. I'm still in disbelief.”
Perron did not immediately respond to an email request for comment. The school board confirmed Tuesday that it had received the legal notice and sent it to its insurance companies.
“The Lester B. Pearson School Board is aware of the situation and takes these allegations very seriously. The investigation is ongoing so the School Board cannot comment on this matter further at this time,” Darren Baker, director of communications for the school board, said in an email. stage.”
Legal notice asking for 350,000 Canadian dollars (nearly $260,000) for violating the country's copyright law, as well as moral and punitive damages, alleges that artworks used by Perron “for commercial purposes bear the student's name as the author, allowing for easy identification.”
It also claims that “the images objectify the students, causing them significant moral harm and can be used, in the future, to psychologically harm or bully them,” and calls for Perón to be suspended from teaching the students and for the artworks to be removed. It has been removed from all platforms.
The “Creepy Portrait” works were named after the students who painted them, and were all signed “Mario MJ Perron,” according to screenshots from an art website seen by The Washington Post. (The site's purchase function has been disabled and the artist's name has been hidden for MP after DeBellefeuille first She posted about the incident on social mediabut the products remained available online for several days.)
DeBelvie's son, Jax, was sick on the day of the mission. But his picture still appears on the website, a dark, bloodstained face against a blue background drawn by his classmate.
Edith Laird, whose daughter Yasmine Fahoumi also attended Byron's art classes, said that when Yasmine came home last week and said her teacher was selling artwork to students, “I didn't believe her at first, so I had to look for myself.”
Jasmine, 14, has appeared twice as an artist and as a subject. In her own painting, she painted a semi-transparent ogre's face. In a phone interview, she described a friend's portrait of her as “a very bad likeness of me” — a kind of creepy Peppa Pig, with oversized features, a curly tail and a knife.
“It is a scandal,” Fahoumi said.
