While Travis Scott‘s legal team is already dealing with hundreds of lawsuits in relation to the Astroworld Festival tragedy, La Flame was hit with another lawsuit stemming from cover art he allegedly stole when his career was just beginning to bubble.
According to TMZ, French artist Mickaël Mehala, who illustrates under the alias Black Childish, is suing Travis Scott for using his centaur artwork for the 2016 compilation mixtape, Travis La Flame
The unofficial project — which featured songs from Scott’s 2015 mixtape Days Before Rodeo, as well as The Weeknd-assisted “Wonderful” — landed on various streaming services, including the rapper’s official YouTube and TIDAL pages.
Mehala claims he sent the centaur photo to Travis Scott on social media in 2016 and the Houston native ended up using the piece for cover art without any sort of communication or compensation.
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According to the French legal docs, Mehala filed for a copyright of the image in February 2019 and eventually heard back from Scott’s legal team that summer, with his lawyer claiming Travis was unaware of the issue.
While the cover art has since been taken down from various platforms, Mehala is still following through with the lawsuit and seeking six figures in damages.
Travis Scott‘s attorney, Ed McPherson, dismissed Mehala’s allegations, claiming the project was uploaded by fans and was quickly removed once streaming platforms realized it wasn’t an official release. He believes the lawsuit won’t stand up in court.
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“This is a frivolous and baseless filing which will almost certainly be thrown out once it has its day in court,” McPherson told TMZ. “Anyone with access to the internet could tell you that Travis never released an album named La Flame.”
He added, “The illustration in question was fan-made and was uploaded to streaming services by fans, something any user has the option of doing. Streaming services quickly removed it after realizing people were trying to pass this off as a real album cover. We look forward to dismissing this case entirely.”
Travis Scott's Dior Collaboration Gets Shelved As Astroworld Fallout Continues
Travis Scott has kept a low profile since his deadly Astroworld Festival in November, which killed 10 people and injured hundreds more. However, La Flame is readying his return to music and currently putting the “finishing touches” on his eagerly anticipated Utopia album in Cabo, according to producer Wheezy.
